End Time Prophesy
- Beth37posted 11 years ago
0I assume you dismiss this b/c it is NT.
Revelation 12:7-12
7 And war broke out in heaven: Michael and his angels fought with the dragon; and the dragon and his angels fought, 8 but they did not prevail, nor was a place found for them[a] in heaven any longer. 9 So the great dragon was cast out, that serpent of old, called the Devil and Satan, who deceives the whole world; he was cast to the earth, and his angels were cast out with him.Exactly so. I asked for an OT reference. Rev is a much later answer to the OT, written by a John, but not the "saint". And it was a dream. Some think it was written by a hermit monk named john in response to, I believe, Isaiah.
No, you didn't ask for an OT reference.
You simply said "find me a passage..."
Is 14:12
12 How you have fallen from heaven,
morning star, son of the dawn!
You have been cast down to the earth,
you who once laid low the nations!
13 You said in your heart,
“I will ascend to the heavens;
I will raise my throne
above the stars of God;
I will sit enthroned on the mount of assembly,
on the utmost heights of Mount Zaphon.[b]
14 I will ascend above the tops of the clouds;
I will make myself like the Most High.”
15 But you are brought down to the realm of the dead,
to the depths of the pit.
EZ 28:12-18
12 “Son of man, take up a lament concerning the king of Tyre and say to him: ‘This is what the Sovereign Lord says:
“‘You were the seal of perfection,
full of wisdom and perfect in beauty.
13 You were in Eden,
the garden of God;
every precious stone adorned you:
carnelian, chrysolite and emerald,
topaz, onyx and jasper,
lapis lazuli, turquoise and beryl.[a]
Your settings and mountings[b] were made of gold;
on the day you were created they were prepared.
14 You were anointed as a guardian cherub,
for so I ordained you.
You were on the holy mount of God;
you walked among the fiery stones.
15 You were blameless in your ways
from the day you were created
till wickedness was found in you.
16 Through your widespread trade
you were filled with violence,
and you sinned.
So I drove you in disgrace from the mount of God,
and I expelled you, guardian cherub,
from among the fiery stones.
17 Your heart became proud
on account of your beauty,
and you corrupted your wisdom
because of your splendor.
So I threw you to the earth;
I made a spectacle of you before kings.
18 By your many sins and dishonest trade
you have desecrated your sanctuaries.
So I made a fire come out from you,
and it consumed you,
and I reduced you to ashes on the ground
in the sight of all who were watching.Deleted
So b/c you are taking the chapter literally, how do you interpret the fact that the king was in the garden of eden? (vs 13)
Or that he was an anointed cherub or on the Holy Mt. of God?"1 And the word of the LORD came unto me, saying: 2 'Son of man, say unto the prince of Tyre: Thus saith the Lord GOD: because thy heart is lifted up, and thou hast said: I am a god, I sit in the seat of God, in the heart of the seas; yet thou art man, and not God, though thou didst set thy heart as the heart of God-- 3 Behold, thou art wiser than Daniel! there is no secret that they can hide from thee! 4 By thy wisdom and by thy discernment thou hast gotten thee riches, and hast gotten gold and silver into thy treasures; 5 In thy great wisdom by thy traffic hast thou increased thy riches, and thy heart is lifted up because of thy riches-- {S} 6 Therefore thus saith the Lord GOD: because thou hast set thy heart as the heart of God; 7 Therefore, behold, I will bring strangers upon thee, the terrible of the nations; and they shall draw their swords against the beauty of thy wisdom, and they shall defile thy brightness. 8 They shall bring thee down to the pit; and thou shalt die the deaths of them that are slain, in the heart of the seas. 9 Wilt thou yet say before him that slayeth thee: I am God? But thou art man, and not God, in the hand of them that defile thee. 10 Thou shalt die the deaths of the uncircumcised by the hand of strangers; for I have spoken, saith the Lord GOD.'"
Explain why there are two different people here. The prince who has said he is god, as many princes said in those days, and a king. Kings often thought of themselves as the sons of gods, and thereby gods themselves. Yet this is what Christians think satan was thrown out of heaven for.
But here it clearly says this is a man, not a fallen angel.
If you notice, Ezekiel is told to talk to several kings as well as the towns, for their sins. Why would he be told to talk to a demon? Does that make sense? Can satan read? Where would Zeke send it? One could interpret the words to literally mean that the king had walked in Eden. That does not mean he walked in the garden of Eden There is actually a place called Eden. He had all the riches of the world. He traveled. He walked on god's mountain, which is a place. He was an anointed Cherub, meaning he had it all, including the favour of god. Until he became corrupt.
Do you know that the land of Nod exists? It is a small group of towns known to this day as Nod.
Or do you think Eden was in heaven or somewhere else? We pretty much know where it would have been by where it says it was in the bible.
But here's the interesting part:
" I have cast thee to the ground, I have laid thee before kings, that they may gaze upon thee. 18 By the multitude of thine iniquities, in the unrighteousness of thy traffic, thou hast profaned thy sanctuaries; therefore have I brought forth a fire from the midst of thee, it hath devoured thee, and I have turned thee to ashes upon the earth in the sight of all them that behold thee. 19 All they that know thee among the peoples shall be appalled at thee; thou art become a terror, and thou shalt never be any more."
Later he tells of how the king of Babylon is to be rewarded for destroying Tyre and killing all it's inhabitants. Here he is saying that he laid him before kings, devoured him, turned him to ash, and he shall never be any more. Does that sound like he lets him run around bothering you? If this is satan, he's gone, And why is satan the king of a city? When did that happen?God was simply comparing Satan to the King of Tyre, in that they were both privileged and both, b/c of pride would be forced from their seat, but you do not believe that. I understand.
You do not believe the serpent in the garden who tempted Adam and Eve to turn their backs on God was Satan. You do not believe the verses that refer to the dragon or the serpent's head being crushed was Satan. You do not believe that the New Testament is the fulfillment of the law or that Jesus is the Messiah. I understand. Thank you for the discussion.It doesn't say that. Why do you believe it? Read it as written. You are supposed to be a literalist.
End of discussion? I understand.You assume quite a bit. That's ok, that is to say, I'm ok with it for the most part.
We cannot come to any peaceful conclusion except to say that God is awesome.
I very much love the Jews, they are God's children, I am adopted into the family, grafted in the vine.
You are still waiting on the Messiah, I have no doubt he has come. What we discuss now, is of less importance than that foundation, and I cannot convince you differently, nor you I. So what is left, but to offer you this blessing:
"The Lord bless you, and keep you;
The Lord make His face shine on you,
And be gracious to you;
The Lord lift up His countenance on you,
And give you peace."And if there is one, may he do the same for you.
You argue a doctrine you are not convinced of? Because why?
I love history and reading ancient texts. I'm a philosopher, both religious philosophy and science philosophy. I love logic and what it reveals when applied to the minds and history of humanity. Is that reason enough? I have more if it's not.
If God is logical to you, then why do you not put your faith in Him?
If He is not logical to you, why argue? It's illogical to me.
Faith is belief. You do or you don't.Beth, with respect to your beliefs, I don't feel that Slarty has to lean one way or the other. For me the open, educated mind is of great value here.
She doesn't have to do anything.
It's funny how you equate undecided with open and educated.
I can't really imagine arguing something I didn't believe. It would seem pointless to me.
Discussing something... working it out... sure, but not to the point of calling others uneducated etc.
It's not a huge deal for me, when something catches my attention, sometimes I comment on it, sometimes I don't.Isn't it important to remain open to the possibity of being further educated?
It's often this aspect which for committed christian believers is the most wanting, in my opinion.I believe the thing that makes a person committed would be the fact that they were not easily swayed. There is nothing bad about education. But as a committed Christian, I would be careful not to take the advice of every "educator" that came my way. I have a deep desire to be faithful. To be rooted and grounded in my faith. You jump to conclusions when you assume that I or any other Christian is unaware or uneducated. It is a very common assumption on these threads, but I have not commented on it until now. I've heard "because you are not formally educated..." etc. etc. How would any of us know anything about any of us? lol We do not walk in each others shoes. We have not walked each other's paths. You have lived through things I cannot imagine... had experiences I never will, and vice versa... this is the nature of life. We should be slow to assume.
That desire not to be easily swayed makes it sound like what you believe is at least a bit more vulnerable than you claim.
If your faith was genuinely strong you would welcome new input and information. What have you to fear? The possibility of changing your mind on anything?You think you're information is new? There is nothing new under the sun Jonny.
That is a diversionary cop-out, Beth, if I may say so.
You think the "good news" is new? Or even news?
I think this might be a reference to all the supposed similar stories to Jesus and his disciples, that many people are willing to believe in, seemingly to discount the gospels as we have them. They think Jesus and his story is one copycat coming after many others. Having taken that challenge seriously, once you study these other tales, they begin to disintegrate. Add in the possibility of interpolation after the fact, etc. Many are copy cats, but each person can study this for themselves. Again, you might see some great belief put into some of the lesser supported stories or myths of the past, by the very same people that seem to have a disdain for belief in anything. Which the irony could be meant to be a sign to the individual doing this but some purposely ignore it I think.
Others have suggested that the idea of many similar stories creeping up would be just the case if indeed Jesus and the disciples walked the earth and did what they are reported to have done. I could be wrong, but then I wouldn't know what he meant either and would have inserted a question mark for clarification too, lol.I figure if she wants to explain her remark she will, if not... I'm watching a really good show, playing scrabble and then off to work. I doubt I'll even remember it by the time I get home tonight.
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Santa Claus was born on the 25th of December and was carved from a Virgin Ice Cave. Santa Claus had 12 Disciples, well, they were reindeer, and technically there were only 9 of them if you count Rudolph Iscariot. Santa Claus had 2 hands and 2 feet, just like Jesus. Huh, huh? You gotta admit the similarities are spooky.Hard to deny, true. LOL
Who could ever imagine Jesus and his disciples pulling off such a copy cat scenario, then in the mean time sometimes successfully fleeing and hiding from those pursuing them (toward the end of Jesus' life). Only to then go boldly to their deaths for a copy cat of other mythologies which often are shown to come after the fact, lol. Tricking those even that didn't believe him along the way. The nerve....
Sorry, that was hilarious, and Rudolph Iscariot, lol. People might think this is totally over the top and it is, but the stories get about so goofy sometimes. Okay, not "quite" but you made the point very well with that, haha.But SC has a red cloak and JC had nothing on - no similarities there.
With respect, this is one heck of a belief shared. That being, that committed Christian believers do not remain open to the possibility of being further educated beyond where they are currently at. This doesn't even seem a coherent statement. To each their own, but one thing I will always do is never be afraid to point out the beliefs of others, while they attack other people's beliefs, lol. So I mean, that often the reasons given for discounting other's views, are just really beliefs of your own.
Do a study of the history of some of the greatest universities, though the facts may be hard to handle if this is a hard belief to shake. Those histories aside, you will actually find many committed Christian believers working hard to further their education all over the planet.I can't really think of any that have been opposed to the possibility of further education, but even if next to none (allowing for a few), you lose the point you tried to make that committed Christians are not open possibility of further education.
This is a very strong belief I see shared by many in these forums, and I think it is a mentality that is damaging especially to those easily swayed by put downs. Anyone can just put people down, but it takes a strong person to really think through the bold accusations put out there by people that normally are seen as intelligent and educated people. They don't take time to wade through the facts of the reasoning behind such beliefs. It turns out some very brilliant people can make grave mistakes in reasoning and throw logic and reason out the window when it comes to their personally held beliefs. Not necessarily speaking of you there unless that applies, but to many that do this and even write books about it. If false statements are made fairly often, then their worldview may not be based on much other than demonstrably false beliefs. Which is crazy ironic. Speaking in general in this last part. I think it is meant to be a clue to all of us, about worldviews that seem to stand on their own, and those that need the extra padding. Just a red flag for truth seekers. I'm convinced more than ever not all are truth seekers though, I used to be very naive in that regard.
It's hardly unique to committed Christians. But again, the unwillingness to make a commitment is not in and of itself the sign of being open to 'further education.' You can be completely committed to one course of action while open to the possibility that you might have to change.
You can learn, but eventually you have to analyze what you know and apply it.
Yes, but the open and educated mind must have logic as a working basis. Keeping in mind Eleanor Roosevelt's statement (I think it was ER) about an intelligent mind being able to hold contradictory views simultaneously, it is still not a sign of higher reasoning or greater intelligence if you state a proposition as a certainty but won't commit. God is or God isn't.
Oh I think you can make a statement with certainty without actually "committing". It's actually the best way to handle cognitive dissonance IMHO. I do it with the evolution/creationism thing all the time.
I think Slarty answered your question before you asked it.
If Slarty loves to read history and ancient texts, then he is reading first hand the information about our world long ago. Contained within that, of course is the history of a great many religions from long ago. And, that is precisely the reason why Slarty doesn't put faith in God. He understands religions far better than we.
Considering there are animals with single horns sticking out of their heads, we can logically conclude unicorns should exist, it is illogical to believe they don't.
Glad to hear someone talk about science philosophy, I don't see that too often. Lots of philosophy gets brought in when people begin writing and talking about what the science must mean for us a humans. Most of the things people disagree on with science, are not the science (like many scientists like to make it seem) but the philosophy. It would be so cool if scientists, professors, and writers let their audience know when they are switching gears from science to the philosophy of science. Even when they don't, you can learn to look for it in discussions. Almost always it comes down to not science, but personally held beliefs, or worldviews, and then the science is explained with that filter put on it. (Or written about with that filter put on it.) Some love to then say that people are not intelligent, etc., for what turns out to be not agreeing with their philosophy. They sometimes act like they are disagreeing with science. Humans are funny creatures!
My point is there is science, then there is philosophy. At the point philosophies get brought in, then I think all philosophies ought to be allowed on the "table" for discussion, for what would best explain the observable science we all do agree on. Instead, certain philosophies are disregarded off the table, and only some, or often one is allowed in that game. A good scientist would dislike this manner of handling science, I would think, as they are often after the truth, not about reinforcing held worldviews or beliefs.
Interesting parameters seem to have been applied in this discussion as far as I can see. If you define things in a particular way, and don't allow certain texts or historical figures to weigh in on the topic, or a whole religion even, then it would be very easy to say that the worldview that does weigh in the most on the topic is simply just fabricating a lie.
I would just add the obvious point also, that even if we didn't see any demonic or evil evidences in the Old Testament, and only in the New Testament, that they could be a very real thing, all the same. If Jesus was the only one that ever spoke on it, they could be real, or even if no one ever broached the subject, they could be very real spiritual beings. We would just have a lot less reason for thinking so. I think rather, that it is part of God's revelation and Jesus was the perfect person to touch on the subject because he had powers over this realm and others that no other man had before or since. If Jesus and the NT writers are simply disqualified, a lot more goes out the window than maybe just demons and Satan. Jesus does too. If Jesus is possibly considered as a real being, it makes no sense to discount his words and experiences with the other realm. (No matter what you want to call it.)
Finally, if we are allowing for demons, and are just disagreeing on their possible "ring leader" (for lack of better words), then what does any of this matter? We will have proved that the Jewish nation was right in their observances etc. It is a matter of the label that is disagreed upon. The effect of the evil spirits would remain no matter what or who their possible first defector was, etc.
As with so much of the worldview of Christianity, the world and its history makes much more sense in light of it. Nothing else quite does to me. Including, that people and people groups and certain worldviews would try to discount it for what may be reasons not necessarily being discussed at the moment.To Slarty, you asked me if you answered my questions and I think you missed this post. I think you answered the other question twice, probably thinking you answered the two posts directed at you. I was curious what your response to these points were?
Interesting parameters seem to have been applied in this discussion as far as I can see. If you define things in a particular way, and don't allow certain texts or historical figures to weigh in on the topic, or a whole religion even, then it would be very easy to say that the worldview that does weigh in the most on the topic is simply just "fabricating a lie".
I would just add the obvious point also, that even if we didn't see any demonic or evil beings/spirits in the Old Testament, and only in the New Testament, that they could be a very real thing, all the same. If Jesus was the only one that ever spoke on it, they could be real, or even if no one ever broached the subject, they could be very real spiritual beings. We would just have a lot less reason for thinking so. I think rather, that it is part of God's revelation and Jesus was the perfect person to touch on the subject because he had powers over this realm and others that no other man had before or since. If Jesus and the NT writers are simply disqualified, a lot more goes out the window than maybe just demons and Satan. Jesus does too. If Jesus is possibly considered as a real being, it makes no sense to discount his words and experiences with the other realm. (No matter what you want to call it.)
Finally, if we are allowing for demons, and are just disagreeing on their possible "ring leader" (for lack of better words), then what does any of this matter? We will have proved that the Jewish nation was right in their observances of Satans or accusing spirits. It is a matter of the label that is disagreed upon. The effect of the evil spirits would remain no matter what or who their possible first defector was, etc. I think what you have shared from the Old Testament proves there are the things that you say the Christian religion fabricated, as being an untrue statement. If I am wrong, please show how. It seems to me the Christians view supports what we see in the Old Testament, from different points of views and eras in history.Right. But in the Jewish tradition they were not all falsely accusing humans, their job was to act like cops. There was some Hebrew writing that suggested that some angels did falsely accuse people and that's why they suffered bad times. So the Hebrews would consider that an evil thing to do. But again, none of those texts is biblical. And the reason is clear. The Jews did not think it was possible for god to be hoodwinked by false accusations. Job is the only one of these stories to become cannon because the satan clearly only follows orders. Hence it is god himself who tests Job.
Remember that there is a difference between the Jews deriving from the tribe of Judah, and the rest of the Hebrew tribes that were scattered and all had their own version of things.
I agree that in the NT Jesus talked about the devil and was tempted by him in the garden before his execution. And Some one wrote about the last days and included a devil.
But you are excluding the Gnostic writing just like the Jews excluded other Hebrew writing, but you are accepting the other Hebrew writing without canonizing it.
Jesus was influenced by a lot of different religions in the region. Even the Greek Cynics who probably said love your neighbor before Jesus did. Christian monks even took on the same clothing they wore and made a vow of poverty.
Christianities influences were many over a long period of time. It all got blended.
I understand you think of Jesus as god. So if he said it, then it is the last word from god. End of story. But again, that's not clearly the case to everyone.Just to be clear, are you suggesting I read and believe all possible texts from ancient times, as equal to eyewitness accounts, and the prophets, etc? Or even the historical books? If any of us did that, it would necessarily include diametrically opposing ideas which is illogical and unreasonable. Understanding the process of how things came down to us matters to me in these cases. On a side note, it sounds like what you describe above is similar to Job, an included and maybe earliest book. I don't see how it makes Christs view incorrect.
Bad cops are bad cops, lol, and maybe people were expressing how that when they sinned, they felt their conscience accusing them? Who knows exactly for sure. As for devils or satan, what about the demonic references, and the casting them out by Jesus? (not just tempted by him before his death, etc.) Also, whether canonical or non canonical, my guess is you would find people experiencing some of the same issues with these beings.
There were probably a lot of people that shared the idea of loving your neighbor before Jesus did. I don't think Christians believed that he coined the term or idea at that point in history and that none thought of it before. The commandments in the OT allude to the same ideas. Not sure what that would prove if you could find a legitimate Greek Cynic that thought it was a good idea before Jesus did.
I believe the writer of even Genesis was influenced by the people of their day, including the ancient Egyptians and that is why for instance the creation story might have been written the way it was. Through the lens of the people of the day, as being written to them. Speaking of early Genesis here.
I am sure Jesus did have his own influences, but he either was or wasn't who he said, and your point about Satan and demons being a complete fabrication by Christianity is either true or false. As for Jesus, he was who he said he was, that is my belief. As for what is clearly the case to everyone, we of course will differ. Whatever is actually the case, is actually the case, and we can try to apprehend what is most reasonable to explain while hopefully being as intellectually honest with ourselves, which includes not letting our worldviews sway us in the reasoning and logic dept.
If we happen to see some blending or similarities from other influences, what does that mean to you? I don't find that it necessarily means anything is proved right or wrong. We would have to look at some particulars in that case and make determinations, while not ruling out any worldviews or philosophies when doing so. (Assuming we want to be fair.) Sorry so long, responding to a lot there.
I think contradictory statements can be held temporarily but ultimately need to be resolved to avoid negative effects.
I am doing that right now with some data I looked at relating to psychic abilities which is pretty convincing although I currently don't believe in psychic abilities. Ultimately I need to be able to explain that data another way, or change my belief. But I don't know which way it will go right now.I suppose you're right, if the dissonance is something that truly matters to you personally. If it doesn't, it can safely stay compartmentalized... which is kind of a resolution in itself. There are several ways of resolving dissonance that don't require discarding viewpoints.
The old "failure to make a choice is making a choice," eh?
Just because it's cliche doesn't mean it's not true
Has to be true or it wouldn't have become a cliche!
Kudos to you for at least realizing you need to deal with the contradictory things in some way or another. I think a lot of our world currently doesn't think critically like that, and it is hurting not only themselves but many others. I am speaking in many facets in life and in general there.
Logically contradictory things cannot both be true at the same time. I am increasingly discouraged that people think this is not the case and act accordingly. Only to find some problem down the road. Unfortunately, instead of facing the issues head on,logically and reasonably, they go after perceived threats in their way to get what they want, which also doesn't make sense. How can people go against the laws of logic and expect things to work out just fine?Psychics have decieving spirits attached to them
OCCULT REPENT
He does seem to tell people all sorts of contradictory things, though.
for the child who i sold on the KOREAN lol
demon are real
principalities
strongholds
Lucifer when he was banned from heaven he took one third angels w him and he duplicated in the demonic heaven aka earth what GOD created in heaven.
like govt
there are different ranks.
GOD in the throne room CHERBUIM SERAPHIM angels
gabriel and michael archangels BIG POWER AUTHORITIES
guardien angels ect
so satan was not very brilliant he copied heavens structure
google 16 strongmen dummyI must say... it is an honor for someone to make up an entire language in honor of me; behind my back; in front of my face
The "15 minutes" are greatly appreciated. My hope is that you forego the funny and spill it. Respectfully...Only God has the answer to that...not even Jesus knows when He will return, only the Father.
I couldn't actually see this post, so I'm just assuming this was a reply to my statement.
I don't think this is just limited to faith. I think this is just a normal human thing. When we're young our entire concept of the outside world is shaped by what our parents tell us, our teachers, church leaders, television. It's imposed on us. So when you get older and gain further life experience, your own experiences allow you to begin to form your own viewpoint. The outside world you experience yourself won't ever be what you had built up in your mind, so it will lead to questions. So I think there's always a period we encounter where that change happens. Where we question what was established before.
I can't say I'm too impressed with how that priest addressed what you said.What do you think he should have said? It's the same thing I've been told here time and time again. We have to believe so we can know and have faith. It's rather silly in my opinion.
Well I don't see the point in telling someone who just said they don't want or need faith to recite Hail Mary's and Our Fathers. But, then again, I don't get that whole concept in general. Reciting memorized lines is nothing more than chanting as far as I can tell, and I always have this mental image of Mary up in heaven just shrugging her shoulders when all these people pray these pleas to her as if to say, "I didn't ask them to do that".
Catholics, they pray to everyone and then say they don't. When you are on the inside it makes perfect sense, but like all religions once you step away it looks bazaar.
What isn't bizarre? Everyday we learn something new, it seems, and it just keeps getting more bizarre. Like Gobekli Tepe. That's bizarre. A place built of intricately carved pillars that date back to what should have still been hunter-gatherer times, like 9000 BC. But no one actually lived there. It's also right in the same region where wheat was first domesticated, according to genetic studies. This place literally has the archaeological world baffled.
But, it won't have the Biblical world baffled, because they'll still believe the Earth is only 6000 years old.
Just you wait until the Earth starts spinning backwards, ED. Then god can turn the clock back and invent us all over again. He might make a better job of it next time.
It is very interesting to observe people sharing their beliefs in these forums, like in this case, that believers of the bible all think the universe is 6000 years old. I know for a fact, that isn't true, so it by definition means it is a personally held belief when absolute fact shows the contrary. If I was mistaken in what you said there, i will stand corrected. Not sure what else that would mean though. For what it is worth, a lot of others believe things that aren't true about all Christians, also.
Barbaric. They eat the flesh of their god and drink it's blood. And you are told it is not symbolic.Now in fairness Jesus did say that you couldn't get to heaven without eating him. And then they wonder why there was no body in the tomb when they opened it.
Funny to me that the most fundamental and literal of bible interpreters go on and on about how John Chapter 6 is just metaphor-despite Jesus making it quite clear that he was NOT speaking symbolically or in parable.
I agree. He makes it absolutely clear that he is not being metaphorical and yet so many Christians in essence call him a liar by insisting it was metaphor. Damn heretics.
Is it really a metaphor? Do we actually eat the flesh of Jesus?
Before a person can understand what it means to eat the flesh of the Savior, one must understand who the Savior is. Many at that time saw only Jesus in the flesh, they didn't yet realize who he actually is.
We can go back to the beginning of John. John 1:14 And the Word was made flesh, and dwelt among us. Back in the Old Testament, Ezekiel was commanded to eat a roll Eze 3:2 So I opened my mouth, and he caused me to eat that roll. Just as Ezekiel was commanded to eat the roll or scroll, we are commanded to eat the Word of God which was manifest in the body of Christ.I respect your right to interpret it in any way that serves your life as you wish.
It isn't about interpretation. It is about knowing Jesus. To know about Him, is not knowing Him. The Bible says it cannot be of a private interpretation but a revelation from God Himself.
Jesus spoke what God told Him to speak, He did what God told Him to do. He was faithful to God from beginning to end. In essence, He was the image of the invisible God, He was the Living Word of God.Invisible God? Doesn't the bible say that God appeared to Abraham?
This is where I utterly disagree with you Sir Dent. I give you respect for your belief while not agreeing with those beliefs because they cannot be held as facts. The god does not exist for me.
How about affording me respect and simply agreeing to differ. Is that too much to ask?I don't mind you disagreeing with me. It happens all the time even between believers. I just thought you might have wanted an explanation.
I apologise for being a bit abrupt there. Today I met with a very nice person who nevertheless had very adamant views coming from another absolutist religion. That puts me in a defensive mood for anyone who might be bullied into submission by religious bigotry.
I admit I always thought it was something like that too. But the Catholic Church and its scholars do not entirely agree. The host and wine become the actual body and blood of Jesus once blessed. The entire thing may be symbolic for the word manifest, but transformation to the actual body and blood is not considered metaphor. It is required as per Jesus.
is the Catholic Church always right? Peter and John told a man that they had no money for him but they gave him what they had. They gave him healing in the name of Jesus Christ. The Vatican today has more riches than a man or woman can imagine but where is the power of healing?
Apples and oranges. The question is, are they right on this issue? The texts themselves, apparently said by Jesus, in one of the most macabre passages of the bible, agree with the Catholic interpretation.
Edit: And by the way, I'm not a Catholic.
Yeah, with all due respect, brother, you can have that conversation with someone else. I think Jesus meant what he said. No interpretation necessary. As a matter of fact, when they asked him to clarify, he simply repeated the directive. And when they told him it was a hard teaching that they couldn't accept, he simply let them move on.
Seems to me that if there was a more palateable explanation, he'd have offered it, rather than losing followers.No problem.
edit: Is anyone else having problems seeing certain posts by others on this thread?Possibly...
I know a couple others over the past couple of days saying they couldn't find a particular post they wanted to respond to.
Also, I often have to refresh several time before a new post appears. I get notified that there has been a post, and it shows on the front page, but takes upwards of a half hour for me to be able to see it in the thread.Switch the way you view threads. Top of the page. I have mine set to chronological. I had problems with these forums too until I switched.
It means I appreciate the help. I already had it set to chronological, tried threaded and hated it.
It depends on what you want to look at.
If in Chronological mode, you'll see one after another posts that come in on a first come, first serve basis, while in Threaded mode, you can actually follow along with a particular discussion without having to wade through a bunch of other posts. Both modes have their advantages.
Yes occasionally the post is no longer available. Is someone snooping and editing out what they don't like, I wonder?
I don't know why it happens, but sometimes it will give you the msg. about the post no longer existing or whatever it says.... even though the post is there and will show up later. If you hit "post reply" you can see the "hidden" msg. and reply to it, or not reply. You can read their post in full, you will not however, be able to see what/who they are replying to.
Think spiritually.
Jesus also said, a man must be "born again." Do you remember the question that was asked of him concerning that?I do, though I know that wasn't for me. In fairness, and for the sake of consistency, we would have to likewise think Jesus meant to be actually born again in that case.
Yup. I sure do. And he clarifies the man's misunderstanding, as he always did when speaking figuratively. That isn't the case in John Chapter 6. And believe me, this is NOT a teaching one can accept without thinking spiritually. That's why so many followers left Jesus that day.
11 Very truly I tell you, we speak of what we know, and we testify to what we have seen, but still you people do not accept our testimony. 12 I have spoken to you of earthly things and you do not believe; how then will you believe if I speak of heavenly things? (John 3 NIV)
Heavenly things are harder to grasp.
...........Think spiritually...........
By the time he got to the body eating part he probably knew that his own would understand and the ones who were not would never. No real explanation needed.I agree completely. Jesus was well aware of what he meant when he said what he did, and well aware that it was a teaching that would not be accepted by everyone.
When you think spiritually, you come to realize that when the man said to eat the word; he didn't mean eat, let your bowels process and then expel. Like that everlasting thirst quenching water; it is to stay in you; spring up; and show some signs.
What comes out of us can be defiling to us and all who listen.I see what you're saying. But I have been led by the spirit to believe differently. I take it as literally as I take Jesus' admonitions about marriage and reserving judgment of others to God alone.
Sorry, you two, but those sentences are completely meaningless and are nothing but a facade to use in place of actual thinking and understanding. You could replace the word spirit with unicorn and it is equally valid.
Well it's a good thing they were having a conversation between themselves that had nothing to do with you and in no way affects your life then, huh?
If you are going to combat everything that seems meaningless and without thinking, I point you towards your nearest public official's office.You mean, like the very same way you're responding to me now?
Sort of... However one of the people you were talking to spends long hours requiring intense conversation and consoling every time that you say the word unicorn. It seems to be an issue not so much with you or with the word unicorn, but the combination of the two.
Since today is my scheduled day to comfort her/give her medication, it effects me personally. The last time I was on duty, she gave me a nasty bite.
The other one, feel free to take whatever steps you deem necessary with.I'm scratching my head to figure out which one's which. No need for specifics I guess.
Yes, it affects all of us personally when beliefs in magical super beings are on the lips and minds of those who hold power over us. That is very frightening indeed.
Ah yes, because the two of them have significant power over you, you know, by possessing different beliefs than you and having absolutely no power (in one case) or desire (in the other) to force said beliefs upon your life in any meaningful way.
You are truly oppressed.Maybe, not them specifically, but certainly people who believe just like them, and you, who hold power over us. Truly frightening.
If anyone who believed as I did had any real power in this country, we'd be living in a very different society than the one in which we live presently.
Ah yes, three people who hold radically different world views yet think "just like" each other. We would, indeed, make exactly the same choices if given positions of power.
I can't speak for them, but I agree that my choices, if given power, would be horrible. It would have nothing to do with my faith.
Just as an aside, you do realize that many Christians would rather keep faith out of the realm of politics, therefore not affecting the general population in any way, shape, or form. In short, you're probably preaching to the choir more often than not.Sorry, but I don't buy that.
Christians might say that, but the reality of is is very different. Given the opportunity to be in power, they will exercise their beliefs.LMAO, well, personally my belief is in separation of church and state, equal rights and general religious freedom. So yeah, I'd probably exercise that. You're right.
I should stop that immediately.
As far as you not buying hyperbole of the exact implication that you are making, um... OK?
Well being an atheist myself, I have to thank the rational Christians who had the wisdom to separate Church and state. Which makes it obvious that what you are saying is true. For the most part all of us just want to live in peace and prosperity. Religion is a personal thing that needs to be kept out of the way when interacting with the rest of our fellow humans. The trouble always starts when that doesn't happen.
The enemy is the fundamentalist of any stripe who seeks power to farther spread their beliefs by force if necessary.
So Cheers to rational Christians. Wish there were no other kind.Oh, I totally get the issue with forcing beliefs upon others. I back what ED is feeling one hundred percent. I just think he needs to aim the gun at those who are doing it. The scatter-shot isn't doing anything but likely insulting those who agree with his gist, if not-perhaps-the extremity of it.
True that .... going outside and burn some leaves. i somehow find peace and solitude burning rubbish on a bright sun shinny afternoon .
Sounds pleasant. I have no idea where my yard is right now. I'm assuming it's under the foot or so of snow. If it wasn't for that, I'd be tempted to join you.
I'd join you as well...I love the smell of burning leaves on a clear and sunny cold day.
Sorry, but last time I checked, you did indeed refer to yourself as a Christian, yes? Correct me if I'm wrong here. If you do, is it because you use it like some sort of fashion accessory or is it because you actually align yourself with Christianity, just like all the other Christians, including those who tell us what to believe?
How you can manage to agree with me is baffling, because if you did, you wouldn't align yourself with Christianity, you would have nothing to do with and would actually like to see it go the way of the dodo and placed alongside the other myths where it belongs as opposed to being one of it's members.
If you somehow think that you're in any different category than any other Christian, I would see that as just another delusion alongside the many Christianity offers.
Aiming the guns, so to speak, is at Christianity, and if you're one of it's members, then those guns are obviously pointed at you, too.Ah yes, aiming a gun at an entire group of people because you don't like the actions of a few is always a wise thing to do.
I know that it is always logical to believe that a billion or so people all share exactly the same viewpoints.
Carry on the good work. Let me know how it works out for you.A few?
Uh, isn't that what Christianity is all about? Or, is it all about believing whatever you want to believe?
I think your God would have something to say about that, if He actually existed. But, since He doesn't, you can spout all the hypocrisy you want and get away with it.I find it funny how often you and the fundamentals seem to agree.
Anyway, that's neither here nor there. I've said my piece and I'm withdrawing from the conversation. Have a good day.Why is that? Perhaps, it's because we understand the concept of calling yourself a member of a particular belief system in that you actually follow the belief system as opposed to it being the fashionable thing to do.
At least with the fundies, they are honest about what they are supposed to do with their belief system, which is to follow it, according to the bible and according to their God.
Can you show that honesty?
God has one mind. Jesus said that the rocks would hollar if his people didn't.
You are correct! Thanks.I'm sorry. That statement seems to make very little sense. Would you kindly explain it so that those of us who speak and read English might understand?
Ok, off the top of my head; when Jesus hit the town, the people praised him. One man said that Jesus should stop them. But when Jesus heard that he said, "the rocks over there would cry out if they should keep silent" or something like that. The thought of it sends chills through me. Some power he has.
"I am driven with a mission from God. God would tell me, 'George go and fight these terrorists in Afghanistan'. And I did. And then God would tell me 'George, go and end the tyranny in Iraq'. And I did. And now, again, I feel God's words coming to me, 'Go get the Palestinians their state and get the Israelis their security, and get peace in the Middle East'. And, by God, I'm gonna do it." - Bush
Maybe. I'm not arguing a logical point, though, just explaining that I believe differently. I'm just using a language that the individual with whom I'm conversing is comfortable with.
Sorry, but I see no difference in your beliefs and anyone else here other then in the details, which is quite common. How do you believe differently? What does that mean?
We are discussing a fundamental difference in Catholic v. Protestant belief about communion. Nothing that in any way affects anyone who holds no belief about it at all.
To be fair, while we are both believers and are both Christians, our priorities in faith differ vastly. I generally have no need for others to share my beliefs or priorities, just to respect that I've a right to them.Oh, I have no problem that you want to believe in something completely irrational and illogical, based on a system of beliefs that have caused huge problems for societies and continue to do so today, wars, atrocities, etc. No problem. I can't wait for the resurrection of the Inquisitions, they must have been a scream, literally.
Well, then, there ya go. I have no problem with anyone's irrational beliefs provided they don't affect people negatively or cause them harm.
Sadly, I can't change or control the actions of my family over history...my family in this case being humanity. I can only do those things for myself. I wouldn't dare burn a witch, for example. She'd be far too useful to dispose of.
I'd leave the heretics and political dissidents alone too. Everybody needs a cause, after all.
I can no more hold myself accountable for the Inquisition than I can hold Steve Jobs accountable for a software glitch in Microsoft Word. I can only make sure that I never become or behave that way. That's my responsibility is making sure those things don't happen. What's yours?If we could ask more of you we would. But we really can't.
Sure you can...LOL And me being me? I'd wear myself out trying to give everyone what they asked for.
Oh, and you better stop with the nicey-nice to professed Christians...lol
You're gonna get your atheist card revoked!
But, that is the point exactly, those beliefs have and continue to negatively affect and cause harm to others.
But, your beliefs and the institution that surrounds it are exactly what caused the Inquisition, so it would be a contradiction for you to not behave that way considering you uphold the very ideals and beliefs that institution stands for. This now moves away from being just illogical and irrational to being hypocrisy.
To show the hypocrisy of holding those beliefs.Beliefs that I share in common with others may indeed have a negative effect on some. I, however, do NOT. If I can't help or soothe or comfort or enjoy people, I tend not to harass them...lol
You're right about the faults, failings, and evil actions of the church over the course of history. The core teachings of said church, however, are not what has caused those things. It was the fallibility of the human beings responsible for its maintenance. There's no excuse for it, and I don't look to make any. I just know how not to behave from that example.
I'm not any more or less hypocritical than anyone else with a heartbeat. I find it to be a sad trait of being human. I can only do my best to live and speak consistently and with integrity, whether I do that believing in God or not ultimately means nothing.
Good question!
The Lord does not believe differently than himself.I was actually looking for an answer, not gibberish, thanks.
And for you it is true. We have already established that this "club" is not for you. No pressure.
Unfortunately, your "club" is what is the problem with much of our world. No one in their right mind would ever consider being a member of such a destructive organization that demands respect but offers none in return.
The Jesus club is different. Not all who assert their Christian status are any more truthful than lies. Jesus has one mind. He told us what it was from the age of 12 until about 33.
You know Genaea, the "I'm the only true Christian" and "I know what the Bible MEANS-never mind what it says," is getting to be a worn and tired argument. You may say that you're no different/better than anyone else, but you really truly believe that you are. I pray nothing but good in your life, but I also pray that you stop treating believers so poorly. If you're trying to shame us into agreement with you by demeaning or discrediting, or even completely doubting our faith, then you're going to sadly be all alone in Heaven. Because if being like Jesus, being a true Christian, and getting to Heaven means constantly speaking to others as though you hold the key to their salvation in your hand (like you do), then chances are good I'll never reach any of those goals, nor will anyone else. I hope Heaven isn't lonely for you, since you're the only one who's gonna make it there.
You have mistaken truth for Genaea's truth. I guess some really cannot tell one from the other. What I say is biblical; not just this one passage right here. It all works together. I didn't write it. I just recite it.
Do you recite and pay attention to the part that says women should not talk in church and should only ask their husbands for understanding scripture?
Why you would want to emulate such a status is beyond me, which is one of the main reasons why it's unfathomable anyone would wish to align themselves to it. I much prefer straight forward honesty, which is why I would make for a very poor member of that club.
At the very least, I can admit to the single bit of honesty you actually have shown is your capacity to follow your belief system, however ill-informed and disrespectful that has come to be. It must be so annoying to see all those other pseudo-Christians who don't really share your fervor, I can understand why you would not think they were real Christians.
But, don't worry about it, they think the same thing of the you, so in reality, there is no such thing as a real Christian.God decides who is real. He can see the heart. We can only tell by what comes out. His sheep know his voice. I feel that I am true to scripture. Perfection is impossible; but truth is imperative. We shall know it and be made free.
Aren't you past due for your sinner sinner chicken dinner moment?
The bible judges. Simply speaking it forces some of God's children to quicken and correct. Others feel judged, become angry, and stiffen their neck. I guess it all just depends on who you're talking to.
Those of us who follow, agree with all of it and continuously seek to learn of him.
If you literally eat Jesus, he will be processed by the bowel and he will be released into the sewer. He wants to stay; and make a difference.You agree with all of it that you can use. And you are certainly fine to be exactly where you are on your path of discernment. You can say whatever you like to comfort yourself in not believing Jesus's own words regarding communion, but there is great truth in the non biblical statement: You are what you eat.
I am wheat!
I love it...can't eat it.
And I do understand. Eating Jesus is about taking him into you, keeping him there, and allowing him to permeate. So if one actually is what he eats then it works (though I really don't see broccoli or macaroni and cheese anywhere in this mirror,"I really would like some right now. )
I guess everyone knows flesh from wafer representation.
And I have to give credit where it's due. I have never met anyone as skilled as you are in setting themselves above and apart from others in just one or two sentences. Kudos.
Skill is God-given. But I'm still just genaea. Above or beneath no one. But thanks for the idea that you have; it could be flattering if I didn't know better.
I know that God favors no one in that sense. I have no more or less ability than anyone. I just listen. Most often with my heart. I know better than to feel above or beneath. We are all the same.
I listen with my ears. But I do understand that you mean you pay attention to your feelings. I have to say that sometimes our feelings can mislead us while good reason doesn't.
Good reason is not possible with god belief.
Your reason, by way of hypothesis, might serve you well if "lucky," but don't count on it being a good reason next time.
No, it's people like you who judge. The bible is just a book written by ignorant men, it can do nothing if left on the shelf.
Like many of the other metaphors in the bible that make less sense if taken literally, this one seems to be no different. To say it is or becomes the literal flesh and blood of Jesus seems a more illogical stance to take, and interpretation added on later. This isn't just an opinion, as Jesus made it obviously clear on that first night of the directive to take the bread and the wine. When he was instructing his disciples there in person, he showed what he meant, (at a time he could have performed a miracle or shown his own flesh for eating, or blood for drinking, as crazy as the interpretation of some would suggest). Jesus in fact gave them actual bread and wine, and not actual flesh nor actual blood. "Do this in remembrance of me." The point was the heart, as usual, to never forget. He never said, by the way, this is now turning into actual blood or bread, and you must always believe it to be that way.
There are simply too many other hurdles besides that obvious evidence. For instance, the bible in no way, ever commands humans to eat each others flesh. I think we are to take it exactly like Jesus and the disciples did, and be more skeptical of added on views later, or more illogical views. I respect whatever people want to believe, but can't support a stranger doctrine that isn't specified by Jesus himself.
Sir Dent, your examples are good ones to make your point. There are countless more to make the point that if taken literally for some personal reason. One introduces more illogical and unreasonable problems than is necessary. Never mind it be a possible deterrent to many to even consider following Jesus. It seems just too weird, and not required in the form of belief, as written plainly in the gospels. We are warned of added on teachings, and this is an example of one that if left alone, would help rather than hinder the cause of Christ.
The water that Jesus spoke of at the well to the woman, the one that would cause her to never thirst again, was also not meant to be taken literal. It was meant to make them think, to be symbolic. To take it literal in many cases butchers the points of the stories or directives, and people that care about being logical, reasonable and consistent in their reasoning would have to add on way too many crazy ideas to even seem coherent to be consistent. Did Jesus mean she wouldn't ever literally thirst again? Or was he using common terms to make points, like he often did? My point is to not put down, but to consider what we believe and why, and if some things need to be rethought possibly.I find that response interesting. There is more to the "Do this in memory of me" conversation. See Matthew 26:26-28. Jesus did indeed hand the bread and wine to his disciples as his flesh and blood. And this is a purely biblical doctrine-spoken by Christ himself as you can see clearly in scripture. It was not added later by anyone.
Here are those verses with some more added for context and clarification.
'26 Now as they were eating, Jesus took bread, and after blessing it broke it and gave it to the disciples, and said, “Take, eat; this is my body.” 27 And he took a cup, and when he had given thanks he gave it to them, saying, “Drink of it, all of you, 28 for this is my blood of the[c] covenant, which is poured out for many for the forgiveness of sins. 29 I tell you I will not drink again of this fruit of the vine until that day when I drink it new with you in my Father's kingdom.”'
He was explaining the metaphor to them, an actually SHOWING them, I agree. In saying what he did, he handed them bread, and clarified what was in the cup in verse 29 above, as fruit of the vine. If ever there was a time to make it actually literal or explain that it was literal, it would have been then. He used bread and wine. It is adding on to say that it is literal. Jesus didn't say that.
He said he would drink the fruit of the vine again with them one day in His Father's kingdom. It was what they drank that night, and he broke actual bread. He was a miracle worker, he could have done whatever he wanted to make the extra point made very clear if it indeed was what was intended.Yours is a very common Protestant interpretation, and I understand it completely.
I personally feel differently, for one reason only: Jesus, when speaking in parables and metaphors about godly things, always, always explained himself. In John Chapter 6, when told by some disciples that it was a hard teaching they could not accept, Jesus did not explain it away as metaphor or parable. Like I mentioned before, he simply restated the directive. At the last supper, he didn't explain it away as metaphor either. He didn't say this is "symbolic" of my flesh and blood. He said this "IS" my flesh. This "IS" the blood of the new covenant. And frankly, that was the predominate understanding of all Christians, including Orthodox Christians, until the Protestant reformation in the 16th century.
It seems to me that if he was speaking metaphorically, it wouldn't have taken someone on a different continent a millennia and a half later to correct our mistake.I understand your view is one held by many Catholics also. I have heard them say that their view was the predominant view, up until certain times. I think we can agree to disagree. Each person can go look at the same verses, with any particular church's teachings put aside, (whether Protestant or Catholic or anything else), and see what makes the most sense to them. That seems fair. I wanted to make sure that others looking on knew that a huge number of Christians don't believe like that, when the accusation is laid at their feet of being partakers of cannibalism. It would simply be untrue. Thanks for your thoughts though, they are appreciated.
You're absolutely right. The majority of Christians are not Catholic or Orthodox so they do not state that belief. Thanks for respecting my explanation. I find it interesting that you see it as an interpretation though, when it's simply a face value acceptance of the exact words of scripture. When others point out that a person in interpreting scripture a certain way an you are in agreement with that interpretation, you rarely point out that there is space for anything but a literal acceptance of the words just as spoken.
I think we can look to the scriptures and surrounding texts and other examples to help aid in what would likely be the best interpretation for such scriptures. I am not sure what you mean by the last sentence.
You would have to take the other examples given to you of the water at the well, and for example Jesus being the vine, and we being the branches, to consistent. Do you likewise take the vine and branches literal? If not, why not in that case? What if a church told you to from a very young age? You would have to take those and others literal, to be fair and consistent in your reasoning for taking what you say the words to be straightforward. We could come up with many more. I am simply saying you would have to be both inconsistent and also taking a harder to believe version of what Jesus said, vs what he showed. I think how he showed it should clear up any possible disagreement or confusion. If we "drink of the water Jesus gives" or offers, will we really not be thirsty ever again? That lady at the well, and all of us would get physically thirsty again, and it is clear it isn't meant to be taken literally (unless I am mistaken and you do?).
I truly think that Catholics think there is some spiritual value in thinking they might be literally eating the flesh of Christ and drinking his actual blood. I have never seen it or read it like that. I also think that Christians can hold their own bread or cracker and drink from their own little cup. We just have different views. All I ask is that we each think it is the best possible interpretation when taking all of scripture together. Some are socialized and brought up to literally believe things a certain way from a young age in Catholicism. Among some of the teachings are to trust the Church and its authority over those in the church. I have learned much more about it in recent years and know many Catholics. I realize how much more I have to learn though too. I am sympathetic to their beliefs though, and understand they are often brought up at a very young age and highly socialized within their family and community of believers.
Jesus said, "Whosoever drinketh of this water that I shall give him shall never thirst; but the water that I shall give him shall be in him a well of water springing up into everlasting life" (John 4:14).
Light is another metaphor used. If after careful study and introspection, a person genuinely thinks it is best to take these and other metaphors literally, then what could I say to them? As long as there isn't some other thing in place causing someone to believe such things, then that is all I could ask. It would still very well be that we would come up with differing views on occasion.I'm not a cradle catholic. I was raised without religion. So there was no being taught anything from a young age. I appreciate the conversation, and am quite comfortable agreeing to disagree.
Ok MotowntoChitown.
Many Catholics are cradle Catholics, as you put it, but I do know of some that become Catholics later in life too for various reasons, including sometimes to be able to marry another Catholic. This was the case for some people I know of anyway. That all doesn't matter so much, but can be of help in understanding where people are coming from sometimes, so thank you for that. I also appreciated the conversation, thank you. Always good to be able to agree to disagree, and I am very comfortable with that as well.I have to say - it is so nice to end a discussion on such a positive note. I appreciate that; thank you.
I do also, and thank you for that also!
Have a great day.
Thought you'd find this interesting.
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/sciencetech/ … tumen.htmlThat is interesting. The ark in the other Sumerian stories is only vaguely described, and usually sounds as though it's box-shaped. I wonder if the dimensions were just the same both ways because it was round.
I think both the Sumerian version and the Hebrew version are describing the same event, but differ much in the same way a story differs from one end of a game of telephone to the other. There's a really interesting story in the epic of Gilgamesh about him traveling to visit the 'flood hero'. I don't recall his name. But Gilgamesh wanted to know the secret to immortality as the 'flood hero' was an immortal who had lived for many centuries. To make his point that Gilgamesh couldn't do it, the 'flood hero' told him to try to stay awake a set number of days. 11 maybe? When Gilgamesh fell asleep the flood hero had his wife bake a loaf of bread each day he slept to show how long he was out. The point being how can he defeat death when he can't even defeat sleep.
Gilgamesh was said to have ruled in Uruk, I believe. One of the Sumerian city-states. He was a demi-god, but didn't live as long as the 'flood hero'. Being that this all would have happened roughly 1000 years before writing was invented, it's interesting to see such commonality in the themes. An ancient age, long before writing, when men and women who lived for centuries existed. Where a man built a boat and survived a flood along with pairs of animals and a handful of people. Where a once universal language was confused into many. Some think the commonality is due to the Hebrew version being inspired by these. But it could also be that they're both talking about the same events that actually did happen. Some of them embellished over the centuries. Sensationalized. Others lining right up with actual history and accurately reflected in the impact that can be seen in the changes this region went through.
I'm sure, now that Iraq is opening back up to archaeological digs, there'll be all kinds of really interesting things turning up.I am sure the Hebrew version came from the Babylonian version which came from the Sumerian version. Well no I am not but the Sumerian version was first, and was the first written. It is also the most logical when you remove the gods and what they did and said.
In the Sumerian version Noah is a merchant. He has a boat that he carries his merchandise on, but is told to build more additions to it. It's a fleet of small barges roped together. He is told to gather two of every local animal and plant.
The timing is the same, the rains come and flood the entire region, not the whole world, though to them it might have been the whole world in those days.
He sends out birds and waits for them, and when they do not come back he knows there is land again.
He thanks the gods, reinstates the sacrifice, and repopulates the region with the god;s help.
The Babylonian Gilgamesh tells the same story but Noah is no longer a merchant. He has to build a really big boat that in reality would sink as soon as it hit the water because there is a limit to how big a wooden boat can be without using metal strapping to hold the wood together.
Then he has to collect all the animals in the world. The world floods, be sends out birds till he finds dry land, reinstates the sacrifice, and is made immortal. Still lives today I suppose.
And then there is the Jewish version that changes things to one god, changes the reason he's angry, but leaves the impossible Babylonian story otherwise unaltered, except again in how it ends. This time it is not about the sacrifice being reinstated, though there was one made, and Noah did not get immortality, he just repopulated the world.
I have no doubt that thus may not be a completely fictional story. Floods happen all the time around oceans, particularly when ice caps start to melt and the sea rises, which happened well over 7000 years ago. Villages would have been wiped out. And who knows, the Sumerian Noah might have actually lived and perhaps did some of the things they say he did.
But because of the plausibility of the story, my bet is that the Sumerian is the first version, or closest to it, and the only one that might have actually happened, if it happened at all.Technically, since there's no knowing how old Genesis really is, it's hard to determine which came first. But, I'm not sure that matters a whole lot. What's more relevant here is what really happened, and like you said, there's a good chance these stories are at least based on real events to some extent. If you consider Genesis is speaking of Adam and Eve as being long-living beings placed in an already populated world, then the Genesis story and the Sumerian stories begin to look a lot alike.
Genesis says 1656 years passed between the creation of Adam and the flood. Within 130 years of Adam's creation it says Cain was banned from the land, it says he feared being harmed by 'others', then it says Cain built a city. According to Genesis 6 the flood came because these beings were breeding with humans and humans had become 'wicked'. According to the Sumerian King's list there were five city-states before the flood. The first, Eridu, was established by a god named Enki. There really was an Eridu, and it really was the first human settlement classed as a 'city' because it's the first sign we see of a society having a class system because whoever lived in the temple at the center governed the working class and managed the city. According to the Sumerians, the temple is where their gods lived and they provided the fruits of their labor for them.
The culture where Eridu was built is known as the Ubaid culture (5500-4000BC). This culture lasted the same length of time as Genesis says passed between Cain's banishment and the flood, 1500 years. And this culture really did come to an abrupt end, which is at least partially due to a flood as evidenced in Ur. A century or so later, the Uruk culture (4000-3100BC) began with the formation of the city-state, Uruk. Both Genesis and the Sumerian King's List say Uruk was established not long after the flood, and both say it was established by one who's described as a 'mighty hunter'. And, there really was a mass dispersion of people from this region early in that period due to a drastic climate change known as the 5.9 kiloyear event (3900BC). From those migrating people sprang up Sumer, Egypt, the Indus Valley, Akkad. Multiple civilzations within a century of each other, each with their own language. All of this happening much like the Babel story describes and happened in the right time chronologically.
But what I think is even more significant is the distinct behavioral change that went along with it. Everywhere civilization grew this behavioral change went with it. This is when humans became male dominant, this is when class systems first began, when wars and organized militaries were first established. And it all started in the Ubaid culture. A behavioral change that really has swept the world in the centuries since. A change that very much mirrors the change brought about by the 'fall story' in Genesis. A change that other cultures wrote about as well, like the Roman poet Ovid ....
"There broke out ... all manner of evil, and shame fled, and truth and faith. In place of these came deceits and trickery and treachery and force and the accursed love of possession ... And the land, hitherto a common possession like the light of the sun and the breezes, the careful surveyor now marked out with long boundary lines."
This would explain why flood myths are so prevalent around the world. This would explain the consistency between all the various mythologies of that region. And it explains that distinct behavioral change that literally transformed how humans live on this earth. If this timeline is right then these events would have happened many centuries before the invention of writing. They'd be faint memories in the psyche of the people of the written age.There you go again trying to make it real.
The Sumerians had the first culture in the region. The Hebrews and other Semitic tribes had not developed agriculture yet. But soon they were drawn to these villages that considered themselves cities.
Abraham was from Ur, as you said, a city in Sumer. He had probably heard all the Sumerian stories, including the fact that Enki and his mother made humans from clay, to work the land for them and to dredge the rivers.
The Sumerians built Ziggurats, which are towers. They represent the mountains where the Sumerians emerged from. They built these towers to house their gods or goddesses. Each city had their own patron god.
The towers allowed the gods yo walk out of heaven, on to the earth, and into the underworld if they wanted to. Hence the story of a tower so high a god feared humans would walk in to heaven.
Abraham left Ur. But it was tradition for people to take their patron god with them where ever they went. So it is likely that Abraham's god, as he is referred to so often, is actually not the one god of Moses and the United Monarchy, but a Sumerian god.
Meaning that King David, through his fictitious Moses story, created Judaism and sealed the notion of monotheism.The behavioral changes were due to a new way of life. From wanderers to farmers and merchants is a big step.
People always see change as evil because there is usually some turmoil associated with major cultural changes. It is not that a war machine was something new, it was just more advanced than before. Tribes always warred with each other.
What you are seeing is a natural progression from tribes to societies.
And I don't see how you can assume tribes were not patriarchy's before the big regional flood.
As to that, the Sumerians say the flood happened because we were neglecting the gods and we were getting too noisy.
The Babylonian version also talks about people not worshiping properly.
The Jewish version says the sons of god matted with the daughters of man. The bible doesn't elaborate much but Enoch does. It is odd to think god had sons isn't it? But not if he was originally a Sumerian god.
Enoch turns the sons of god into angels sent to watch humans and report back to god when we sinned. Apparently god did not make female angels because unlike human males, they would not need the pleasures of woman, as they were basking in the glow of heaven all the time and humans were toiling and needed distraction and comfort.
But the angels had other ideas. 12 of them decided to make a pact to go out and mate with human woman, and that's what they did. That created a race of giants who became completely immoral, and even cannibalistic God decided to get rid of them all and punished the angels in question by causing the flood.
Son's of god? Angels? Or aliens? Sons/crew of an alien scientist who thought pretending to be god would help human progress. His men mate with early humans and create us in the process. lol... His commander has to wipe out what they did, but one of them saves a single family of hybrids.
This stuff just lends itself so well to endless fun speculation.I'm not speculating. First off, tribes did not always war with each other ...
"it is an error, as profound as it is universal, to think that men in the food-gathering stage were given to fighting... All available facts go to show that the food-gathering stage of history must have been one of perfect peace." - Archaeologist WJ Perry
"For the first ninety-five thousand years after the Homo sapiens Stone Age began (until 4000 BCE), there is no evidence that man engaged in war on any level, let alone on a level requiring organized group violence. There is little evidence of any killing at all." - Anthropologist Richard Gabriel
Second, even after the advent of agricultural practices, for 3000 years societies came and went without changing how they interacted with one another. Societies with populations in the thousands, and even tens of thousands, still showed no class stratification and men and women were of equal status, and there was no violence ....
"the prevailing view is still that male dominance, along with private property and slavery, were all by-products of the agrarian revolution...despite the evidence that, on the contrary, equality between the sexes - and among all people - was the general norm in the Neolithic." -Riane Eisler, American Scholar, Cultural Historian
"There is the same lack of evidence for violent conflict throughout the simple horticultural period of history as in the hunter-gather era. Graves don't contain weapons; images of warfare or weapons are still absent from artwork; and villages and towns aren't situated in inaccessible places or surrounded by defensive walls." - Steve Taylor, The Fall
We know tribes were not patriarchies. There is a distinct change that can be seen in the archaeological record, and traced. These aren't assumptions. Even indigenous cultures that still exist today behave in much the same way. All members, including women, have equal status. No, the change we see does not resemble the 'natural progression' you'd expect. It's rather sudden. Like the boom of inventions ....
"The thousand years or so immediately preceding 3000 BC were perhaps more fertile in inventions and discoveries than any period in human history prior to the sixteenth century AD" - Archaeologist and Philologist V. Gordon Childe
"a tremendous explosion of knowledge took place as writing, mathematics, and astronomy were discovered. It was as if the human mind had suddenly revealed a new dimension of itself." - Anne Baring and Jules Cashford, The Myth of the Goddess
The book of Enoch was written about 300 BC. The books of Moses were ancient even then, and considering there were pharisees in those days who were dedicated to reading and properly understanding the Torah, it's clear they did not have the level of insight that the book of Enoch and others suggest. Throughout the bible the 'sons of God' are always only humans. God only refers to the Israelites as 'sons' in the OT, and in the NT believers are then included as 'sons of God' through faith. Plus, there's this ...
Hebrews 1:5 – For to which of the angels did God ever say, “You are my Son; today I have become your Father”? Or again, “I will be his Father, and he will be my son”?
Luke 3 specifically says everyone from Adam to Seth to Enoch to Methuselah, Noah, Shem, Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, David, etc, all the way through to Jesus were 'sons of God'.War Before Civilization: the Myth of the Peaceful Savage (Oxford University Press, 1996)
Spengler (4 July 2006). "The fraud of primitive authenticity". Asia Times Online. Retrieved 2009-06-
Windschuttle, Keith (16 August 2003). "Enduring myth of 'noble savage' vs. a species at continuous war?". Washington Times. Retrieved 2009-06-08.
Lehmann-Haupt, Christopher (18 July 1996). "BOOKS OF THE TIMES;Even in Eden, It Seems, War Was Hell". New York Times. Retrieved 2009-06-08.
Most modern anthropologists and historians have recognized that tribes were always violent. Even tribes of Chimps war with each other. You are a little behind the times.
But yes, there is a lot of controversy about it all, but there is even current evidence that we fought with Neanderthal. It seems absurd to me to think we wouldn't have always been warlike.
As to sons of god being sons of men in Genesis that wouldn't make sense because they mated with the daughters of man. So there would be no difference. Humans with humans. Big deal. And god tells them that their life is eternal and the human woman's lives are fleeting..Big clue for you right there.
And then there is Job, "Now it fell upon a day, that the sons of God came to present themselves before the LORD, and Satan came also among them."
Sorry, not human sons. Try again.I have no doubt we fought with Neanderthal. Homo Sapiens pushed both the Neanderthal and megafauna out of existence. They 'filled and subdued the earth', and in the process of doing so they established dominance in the animal kingdom. Leaving themselves the only remaining species of the Homo genus, populating and dominating every continent of the world.
The level of violence that erupted in the 4th millennium BC is unparalleled. Even in heavily populated cultures that lasted for hundreds of years each before that point there were no defensive walls or signs of violent attack being a concern. That all changed starting in the Ubaid culture moving forward. And that change can be coursed, spreading from that central point out, covering the world. The entirety of our human history is the tale of civilized nations expanding their territory and wiping out the indigenous cultures. And out of this same boom came civilization, writing, mathematics, astronomy. This was no 'natural progression'. This was a dramatic change on the psychological level. Land became a possession to be defensed. People became possessions through the beginnings of slavery. Graves were no longer uniform for all, homes were no longer uniform.
As for the 'sons of God', if you'll recall just one chapter before God tells them that human women are mortal and only live to 120 years, the genealogical list of the patriarchs explains that they all lived for centuries. To a human who lives 120 years or less, they'd seem god-like, living through a number of generations of a mortal human. And it's after this and the subsequent flood that it shows that lifespans from that point forward sharply decline from generation to generation. Something that resulted between the 'sons of God' (Adam and everyone 'of Eve') mating with 'mortal' daughters of humans.
But what makes that a really big deal is the capability that was introduced into humanity through this intermingling, free will. That's what makes that most significant. It says humanity became 'wicked'. This is why. The free will God introduced into the world through Adam had at that point been introduced into humanity. This is why it says God regretted putting humans on the earth.
As for the 'sons of God' in Job, Genesis shows that God at one time conversed with Adam, Eve, Cain, Abel, and Enoch at the very least. Could the patriarchs have been the 'sons of God' that met in council with God and satan in Job? The title 'sons of God' would seem apt to describe beings who showed up in the region and live many mortal generations. It's just assumed that these mentioned in Job were angels.
Chanting repetatively, especially in a large harmonius group, can bring profound physical and mental benefits. Possibly this has a lot to do with hyperoxygenation of the brain and body. Many would claim that the vibrations present also influence to a deeper degree.
Much of the christian style of worship has the same effect, for the same reasons.
For Slarty, I can't find the post right now, but it seemed that you alluded to the idea, that what Nero did to Christians was for some other reason than their religion? You said something about Rome accepting all religions? So I couldn't shake that idea, and wanted to ask rather than keep looking. Could you expound on what you meant by that, or correct my misunderstanding? Thanks.
When Rome was founded they accepted the idea that there are many gods. They were pagans and believed that for Rome to prosper people had to worship the gods. That was the culture. It did not matter which god you worshiped on your own, the more the better for Rome, but there were gods that were preferred by Romans.
Later Rome started conquering other lands. Each new land came with new gods. So if they could get those gods on side all the better. No matter where they went they respected the gods of the territory they were in and accepting them as being real.
They even mixed their own gods with the gods of Greece. Apollo is Greek, but he is Sol in Rome. Same god different name.
I said nothing about Nero. There were other Emperors who persecuted Christians. And others that left them alone. But their first problem was the Jews. They refused to honor the Roman gods, and claimed they were false. There was only one god. They also did not accept that the Emperor was in a sense a son pf god on earth as Caesar was. Not all Emperors were, but they were representatives of the gods on earth, They were the pope of all Roman religions.
So the Jews saw persecution, they even tried some rebellions, but for the most part they got along under Roman Rule without being fed to the lions. They never got persecuted to the extent that one of their off shoots did. Why was that?
Well the Christians were not a sanctioned sect of the Jews. Most Orthodox Jews didn't like them. For Rome they were a pain because they martyred themselves, some groups destroyed pagan temples, and they preached and protested to anyone who would listen. They were spreading the news, but insulting the Roman gods and Rome at the same time. The Jews kept their religion to themselves. They never got a directive from god to spread the word. Now in a sense it was being spread in a different form by these pesky Christians.
Most of us don't like the Saturday visit from the J.Ws, Early Christians were obnoxious. All this from the diaries kept by Emperors and historians, by the way. And how could it not be so? It's like that now.
So since they were a relatively new and small bunch, Rome thought it could eradicate it, but they couldn't. By the time Constantine came to power his mother had become a Christian.
But the dynamics of Rome had changed. Constantine did not rule by himself. He took the moto of the Emperor who ruled before him. "One Emperor, one god." But the god he envisioned as the one was Sol, not Jesus.
That would later change as he conquered his co-emperors and finally ruled alone. He was also facing more rebellion and civil war. So he did what Rome had been unable to do by force. He took over Christianity and thereby put it firmly in Roman hands. It was genius. Then as Romans did, he standardized it, refusing to accept any independents. He wanted a Catholic/universal church. He got it. The Christians got their rights and their land back.Hi Slarty, my mistake about the comment about Nero then. Glad I asked and thanks for answering. I do have some ideas why the Christians might have been persecuted more than the Jews and anyone else believing in any other gods.
How did early Christians martyr themselves? As for Jews vs Christians and spreading the word to others, it seems that God did that work for them in how he worked through the ancient Israelites in the day. People like Rahab the harlot was saved through God's work, and she said as much. I have always wondered at the fact they don't want to share their worldview with others to give them hope from it if there is any to be had from it.
You call them pesky Christians, and I know there are pesky Christians. You mentioned you don't like your Saturday visits from the JW's. Do they come to you every Saturday, or to anyone you know of? I don't know of anyone like that, though I did know some nice ones and welcomed them at my house to talk. I always tell people that if they are ever put out by such people, to kindly ask them to please not come back. I don't know of any that would return in such a case. I don't know if that qualifies as being pesky, but it might, but certainly not to the point of deserving persecution?
You say that Christians were obnoxious then, like now. But all groups have some very obnoxious people within it. So that doesn't get you anywhere really with that being the complaint. So what WOULD explain a tolerant culture being tolerant of all views BUT one?
As for Constantine, if you can step out of your worldview for a minute to consider something, being fair minded..... Perhaps one point is that it was seen as drastic and worth considering why his own mother would become a Christian. Perhaps she had good reasons like so many do. It is possible! Even to skeptic atheists!
That even Rome could not eradicate Christianity as you say, is VERY interesting to me. Usually they were capable in regards to completing what they set out to conquer. Is it possible that God had a hand in protecting his very message if it was indeed his message to not be squashed by mere man? I think so, absolutely. That is one very reasonable explanation, if it is true.
One more thing I must suggest in response to these posts kind of suggesting how annoying and pesky the Christian message is, as well as Christians. There is an explanation that would explain it all, and that would be if Christianity were true. This includes perceived peskiness, that hits on a persons biggest issues/nerves, in their whole life. The dying to self and sin, repenting, acknowledging what we have done and loving others that want you dead...? Those are pesky and meddling things for sure! It is much easier to the rulers of our own lives, to answer to no one, and do all we want to do without question. Who wouldn't want to quiet such a message as the Christians shared it? Also, if it is very much true, then it is by far seen as the most threatening. This makes sense of what we see today. People don't feel especially threatened by even Islam compared to Christianity, even with their history. Why is that? Its crazy strange. Because JW's might come by once on a Saturday? No...because the message is uncomfortable to those that would not have it. It is actually much easier to want to quiet the message and messenger, but when it doesn't quite make sense and people are willing to believe in stranger things to explain it, I think it is meant to be a personal red flag for those engaging in such behavior.
Just some possible thoughts for those to consider that think only one group really deserves persecution they get. (Or have gotten in the past. They do now too, on going. Many don't know about it, world wide. Christianity's worldview makes sense of that, over any other one, that I have ever heard.)I never said I thought they deserved persecution. I know they didn't. And Christians are not all pesky.
And yes it obvious that you would think that the reason evangelism rubs people the wrong way is because it is true.
If you think the Christian god is true then you would think that. Just as I who do not believe in the Christian god, by default, do not believe that either.
All I am saying is what is written as the reasons for disliking Christians.
You ask how they martyred themselves? Well though it was not law early on that Christianity was illegal, it was the Governors of some states that made it illegal. The reason being that they were Pagan and believed as strongly as you do. They believed that Rome was founded by the Pagan gods and protected by them.
To worship them as well as your own god was expected of every citizen, and to not do it was tantamount to treason and sacrilegious. Yes, there was even a time Christians were referred to as atheists in Rome.
So in certain states Christians would simply give themselves up to be martyred. They would denounce the state and ask to be executed. Many governors obliged them until it was clear that it only gained the cause more support and more people willing to mimic martyrdom.
One governor faced with a growing crowed of would be martyrs, executed a few of them, and then got fed up and told the rest that if they wanted to die they would have to jump off a cliff or find some other way to do it themselves, and sent them home.
Yes, Christianity and Judaism were persecuted and not other religions, because they were not tolerant of Roman tradition. That pissed the Romans off. That in turn caused friction between the two which escalated.
What happens now if a Muslim says things against America? Do you welcome them in? Would you tolerate Muslim Americans denouncing the state and insisting on Shariah law? American Muslims don't do that, and if they did they would be persecuted. You betcha. If they destroyed Christian Churches? But they don't do that as members of American society.
But again, there were periods where they were not persecuted. And then something would happen and the Roman Citizens would insist something be done about them. They became scapegoats at times for anything that went wrong. But that too is human nature. Someone gets a reputation as a troublemaker and soon they become one of the usual suspects to be rounded up.
Remember they were considered a danger to the Roman way of life because they wouldn't worship Roman gods. They thought that would piss off the Roman gods and being trouble for the empire.
This is exactly the mentality that if you are not a Christian, you work for the devil. Which is why no Christian, Muslim, or Jewish theocracy can ever be allowed to come to power. It always ends in someone being persecuted.
It in't that people fear Christianity more. We just remember it better. Several hundred years of inquisitions and religious wars. And persecution of everyone not believing what is to be believed according to the church, both Catholic and then Protestant.
It isn't that people fear Christianity more than Islam, it is that we have good reason to fear both equally. And not because they are both true.Just going to respond to one part first. I wasn't saying its reasonable or logical that Christianity is feared, and far from it. It is the strangeness that we observe that it is, that ought to be a red flag.
I totally disagree it is to be feared like what you compare it to. I think that is highly unreasonable, especially if your worldview is correct. It doesn't hurt you to have to tell a JW to please not come by your house on Saturdays, or does it? I maybe shouldn't assume.
To a world that claims to be tolerant of worldviews, but couldn't be then and can't be now to Christianity, that is very strange at best. I am not saying all Christians live out the two greatest commandments and golden rule or anything, but to be feared makes no sense. I think that part of my point was totally missed, that you responded like you did, or perhaps you want to explain. If Christians are perpetrating crimes against you that I don't know of you always have the regular courses of actions that you would against any criminal. So not sure what you are speaking of. It actually frightens me that people think like this. I think it is part of the problem of our country and the world. To say it so nonchalant like, yikes. My guess is that you think how the OT Israelites dealt with particular enemies in their times of war, are directives for Christians today? Would that be a true statement? Many actually do believe that falsely, about Christians, but Christians do not, nor did Jesus. It would surprise me coming from you as you say you like to study history and philosophy, etc. This is why I am not assuming and asking for an explanation for such a far out thing to say and believe.You do misunderstand. I do not fear the average Christian. Most don't bother me. I live among many of them and they are nice people. I live among nice Muslims too and nice Jews, and nice people in general. That's the way I like it.
My fear and that of any reasonable person is that any one of these religions get in to power and turn our countries into theocracies. Every Christian, Muslim, and Jewish theocracy has always persecuted those who did not conform to their way. We see that all too clearly from history.
So it is that we have ample reason to fear; an erosion of the separation of church and state. Christian Muslim and Jew need to fear each other getting the upper hand. Better no religion is allowed to rule. Each tells us the others are a danger to them.
So protecting all the people from each other is the only way to protect religious freedom, as well as freedom from religion, and keep the peace.I don't think Christianity teaches we are to live in a theocracy now, and even Jesus showed how to live in a pluralistic society. The society like you described of the Romans back in the day could be one example, or today's society. He taught to obey laws, pay taxes, etc. He believed in kicking the dust off your feet if people didn't want to hear from you. It is very different from Sharia law as we observe today in certain countries and I don't see Jews pushing for them to have a theocracy here now either, but I could be mistaken by that.
We see evil from all worldviews, but not often from Christians unless you look back to many many centuries ago which is its own whole topic. Godless regimes have perpetrated many more crimes against humanity in just the most recent centuries, for example. You want to be fair when talking about ruling authorities that would want to hurt people right? Theists are not evidently the ones to fear unless they act so, like we are seeing currently by one theistic worldview. I would ask that people be fair in this regard, if they care about fairness.My fear and that of any reasonable person is that any one of these atheists get in to power and turn our countries into state sponsored atheist countries and kill 60 million to 100 million people.
As a person of a-theist thinking I am not asking/wanting you to become atheist. I am simply asking you to refrain from asking/wanting me to become theist, especially christian or islam theist.
You have no need to fear me or my moral standing. Can I trust you and your's?Yet you hang out on Christian threads. The irony.
Yes I do - for at least two reasons.
First, I was years ago a "Born Again" It felt good to be accepted by a group for me, a loner most of my life. Gradually I saw the hypocracy in myself and had the impression there was a lot of it in others, too.
I asked deep questions of myself. Found other ways of looking at the important questions of life. I really have, through a lot of searching, some extremely difficult dilemmas, but mostly keeping honest with my inner conscience, become a free spirit....free from the demands of conformity. And from the emotional bullying which is often a part of evangelism.
My second reason is that I have much respect for those who retain their theist and christian belief without the arrogance which says I must believe what they believe. I like the brotherly/sisterly love that says we can each tread our unique path, share the freedom to choose and learn from each other.
There is a third reason - to counter any ignorant presumption that just because a person is a member of this or that clique, he or she is automatically "better" or "more moral" than someone of anther group.
Oh I can see the reply forming on your tongue even now! "Oh, but I am saved, you are not." Don't waste your time or breath.... been there, done that, thanks.
If your wish to continue a discussion with me on that basis feel free. But if you once think you need to convert me, that tells me more about your emotional needs than mine. Drop it.
Besides the Pope and the 2 Jehovah Witness guys that visit you every Saturday, how many other Christian theocracies have you survived?
Slarty, you say,
"Every Christian, Muslim, and Jewish theocracy has always persecuted those who did not conform to their way. We see that all too clearly from history."
I don't need examples from Islam or Sharia due to current events, but curious what your best examples of the Jewish and Christian Theocracies are in history that support your point above? Just so we are all on the same page and following your train of thought and reasoning, thanks. The Christian and Jewish theocracies that persecuted those who did not conform to their way.
By the way, I am not doubting people can abuse their power, as you are right we do see that in history. I know that I have observed atheists and others using the heretics of a religion to blast said religion, which ironically is supporting the teachings of said religion sometimes. Many people agree it would be better to act like Christ would and taught, than kill supposedly if they didn't conform to the beliefs. Jesus and his followers didn't kill, but many spilled their own blood due to their own teachings. If it is abuse of power and distortion of teachings, it is a tip of the hat that the teachings are good. Not so with the other religion we are talking about.A theocracy comes in several forms. But it means that the state is run directly by laws created by a religious group.
The Jews always lived in a theocratic state. In it's earliest form under Moses the Hebrews committed genocide wiping out every man woman and child of at least 7 tribes on their way to the promised land. All because Moses said they were commanded to by god. After that they didn't have much of an opportunity to persecute anyone as the Hebrews were taken by Assyria, and the remaining Jews were taken by Babylon later. We won't talk about the current state of Israel.
The Christians started inquisitions as soon as they gained power of the Roman Empire. The united Christians persecuted Pagans and anyone who didn't believe what they did, even other Christians. Atheism was of course illegal and punishable by death.
After that, every monarchy was under the pope's rule. Kings were made by the Church and destroyed by it. Persecution happened all the time. It was the norm Particularly witch hunting and heretic hunting.
Then they turned on themselves. The reform came and Protestants soon were at war with Catholics, depending where you lived, if you weren't the right brand of Christian you were burned as a heretic by both the Catholics and the Protestants. The wars lasted over 300 years and took countless innocent lives in the name of god.
Christianity and power do not mix. That's pretty obvious. It sounds nice on paper with love your neighbor and all, but in reality it doesn't work out when you are the only game in town. You had 2000 years to prove otherwise and failed miserably.
And Islam? Well you can see what Islamic theocracies are like. Atheism is still punishable by death in at least five countries around the world. Most are Islamic countries.
But it is the nature of the beast. Any ideology that gains power becomes threatened by competing ideologies, and begins trying to protect itself by persecuting the others. Communism did the same when it came to power. Fascism wasn't any better.
Democracy, and particularly social democracies that value other cultures are the best hope we have for peace between competing ideologies, because the multicultural society of today is inclusive and accommodating. Yet no one ideology except inclusion by all, is the ruling faction.
Even then we have problems. Of course we do. It is so much simpler if all the people you live with believe what you do and value what you do. But if you want a world like that you exclude all others. You see them as a danger to your way of life. Soon you persecute them.
In a democracy that has a real separation between church and state, no religious ideology has power. Only that way can we be inclusive and protect the rights of everyone to believe what ever they like and live how they like, within the boundaries of the law. And there are always boundaries.It is as I suspected, the people that kill for their religion have no place calling themselves followers of Jesus' teachings. To kill a Pagan for example, is going against Christ, so the example is one in support of Christianity ironically, not against it.
If it makes you feel any better, I know they would have considered ME a heretic, and I would be lumped in with those killed. (kind of a joke there, but I really am convinced of that the more I learn.)
This is not proof however, that Christianity and power do not mix, as you gave examples of people NOT using Christian principles to make your point. It is not obvious, as you say. Anyone can kill and give reasons for doing so. They wanted to kill and distorted so much by that point and I think it part of the reason for so many pointless deaths.
Still I don't believe the bible teaches we are going to live in a theocracy now, as I stated before. I could be wrong on this, but if anyone would have changed that, it would have been Jesus and he chose to instead live in a pluralistic society.
Using the heretics of a religion to go after the religion only shows you have nothing legitimate to go after. It also is an old trick. I mean you can't blame the religion itself for what the people did that had to go against the religion to do the murder.
Like we showed yesterday, the worst of the recent atrocities against mankind, especially when we have history to have learned from, came from non theist regimes and leaders. This is undeniable, and removes all points made.
The (mostly) Christians that helped create this country, believed in Democracy for many reasons and probably including the reasons you stated. This amazing country we lived in came from the minds of people that were committed to God. Not all were Christian bible believers that believed in having a personal relationship with God. They were mostly Christian AND did not create a theocracy. That is in keeping with what I was saying. It is the best form of freedom for all. The last part where you describe the best society, that is what we had for a long time. We are starting to get away from that and it concerns me. The second ANY ideology thinks its ok to persecute one particular group, we are right back where we don't want to be. I hope we never get there.
What is your best source and worst example of some of the more awful things that Christians did back then that is worth comparing them to terrorist extremists like in 9-11 today? I am truly curious because it seems to go so against what Christianity teaches, and not that I won't believe you just for saying it, but am curious your actual source and some quotes from it here if possible? These Christians in question seemed to endure more persecution for not worshiping the gods of the day, more than the Jews even. Wondering at the genuine cause and effect and thanks in advance for your answer! This is interesting stuff and I am ready to learn.
I read a lot of books and speeches over the years. Do you want history book sources? If you type something like "reasons for Christian persecution in rome" in yahoo or google I'm sure you will get the basic stuff I am saying here with referances.
The Christians were not bad in general and not usually violent. I'm not saying that they did anything horrible, or anyting that I would consider warranted persecution. Most were peace loving people. But all movements have their zealots. They vandalized a few pagan temples. They denounced Rome and it's gods. The main reasons I gave were that they refused to worship the roman gods and that was seen as treason. It was considered a superstition, which in Rome meant more than it does now. It meant that it actually taught subversive ideas against the state. It was heresy. It was witchcraft which could anger the gods and bring Rome trouble.
So Romans were naturally worried. They often misunderstood Christians. Christians called themselves brother and sister, so some thought that meant they were incestuous. They were accused of cannibalism because of the fact that they eat their god and drink his blood.
Here is a nice quote from Emperor Julian about Christians where he calls them atheists, but in the same breath praises them. You will like it.
“Atheism (Christianity) has been specially advanced through the loving service rendered to strangers, and through their care for the burial of the dead. It is a scandal that there is not one single Jew who is a beggar, and that the godless Galileans care not only for their own poor but for ours as well; while those who belong to us look in vain for the help that we should render them.”
So they were winning people over, obviously, through their philosophy of love. But driving them away by their refusal to respect the Roman gods.The top paragraph of the top result for Christian persecution in rome gives this as its first paragraph,
"Persecution of Christians in the Roman Empire began with the stoning of the deacon Stephen and continued intermittently over a period of about three centuries until the 313 Edict of Milan issued by Emperors Constantine I and Licinius, when Christianity was legalized. Christians were persecuted by local authorities on a sporadic and ad-hoc basis, often more according to the whims of the local community than to the opinion of imperial authority."
This is some of the same persecution I was originally thinking of, and along the same lines. The article goes on to go into some details about some basics of law and how it turned later to be persecution for heretics, deemed so by the state.
I am glad you are kind of backing down on some of what you said before about fearing them like some other religions. That, and also backing down on that you didn't think they deserved persecution as a whole (except for particular crimes needing answering like temple damage, etc. or non respect of Roman Gods.) I think if some destroyed a temple, they ought to be charged with such and pay the consequence. It seems to me that the state at the time was a bit religious itself, and I am sure you in fairness would be equally against the Romans for their beliefs and not allowing citizens to believe as they wanted in one god vs. many? Their superstitions seemed strong. I hear your point now, and it is more in line with what I thought. If you were there, I don't think you would have liked the Romans, based on how you believe now, correct?At the time, all states (Rome included) were essentially religious. Emperor worship, worshipping the Emperor as a manifestation of one of the gods, was a very real practice.
The Jewish religion was tolerated in Rome because it was an ancient one. They had respect for that. The Christian religion, especially once it started diverging from Judaism, was a novelty (which has a slightly different meaning back then) and since it forbade emperor worship, it was seen as a threat to the empire.Thanks Chris,
I have studied Roman history only some, not to a great extent but hope to more one day. The little I do know does line up with what you say, and I did learn some more too here, for the sake of clarification so thanks for that.
What I noticed was some irony that I couldn't help but point out. The facts as I understand them are that Rome was religious, and not just religious but very much so and ruled in that way. Jews were tolerated, as their religion was at least a bit older. So we then get this new idea, that stands up to the religious rule of that day and doesn't conform and bow down to the religious governments specifications. They are then persecuted for that.
The sheer irony cannot be missed, that Slarty and others are in this case defending the religious system of the day that was persecuting others that wouldn't bow down to what they wanted, and were even called atheists for it. I was trying to point it out in a less obvious way I guess (about the Christians) and the more I thought about it, I had to make sure we all are observing how in this case, it is not the supposed ideas people are against, but once again the Christians in particular. If consistency and logic reigned supreme, we would not be seeing the arguments for the Romans over and against the Christians. It gives me pause after a chuckle, only to realize its not that funny, and yet somehow not an evidence to those that I wish it were. I hope you get what I am saying.I did not defend their religious system I explained it. You seem to have misunderstood.
My point was, normally you would be defending the ones being persecuted by a government forcing people to worship religious deities that they didn't want to, etc. They were even called atheists, and being literally forced against what they thought was right. I don't believe in that kind of thing, and I know you don't either. Correct?
Did I miss a condemnation or anything like it by you of those Romans? If i did, I apologize, and ask you show me where?I thought that was implied. I even said I personally saw no reason what so ever for them to be persecuted. I was simply explaining why they were persecuted.
Oops, part two response to Slarty,
In your response to history book sources, sure that would be great! I also love history, and think it tells us much about humanity and their behavior and embracing of good or bad ideas. I would love to read a good book on this topic, great to always keep learning. I have one yet to read called Constantine's Sword, that I picked up, it looks interesting.
So glad you say that Christians were not bad in general and give a quote supporting that they were good in general, and you are right, I did like it, so thanks for that. It seems to be in keeping with the teachings of the man they were following.
You said, "The Christians were not bad in general and not usually violent. I'm not saying that they did anything horrible, or anyting that I would consider warranted persecution. Most were peace loving people. But all movements have their zealots."
This seems totally fair and in line with what I read in history also. Not good to vandalize a few pagan temples, and that sounds like the work of zealots and would not be supported by the teachings of their own religion.
It is interesting they were seen as practicing witchcraft by another religion, ruling their day. You say Romans were naturally worried, yet the reasons given were religious so that is a little confusing considering your non support of societies allowing a religion to be the basis of rule.
Again, thank you for the quote from Emperor Julian about his observation of the atheists (Christians of the day). I had not heard that before. Glad to see you come down some from what I thought were a little harsh against Christianity. The Jews, did they have much to show to compare them to the other religion we were discussing in the way of being feared? I like how you ended with the quote and what you said. It makes sense, even though the other stuff before didn't make so much sense to me, and now we see why.
were getting close. I know a lot of people have been having the same reoccurring dream about an incident where everyone dispersal that's related to a phenomena in the sky.
I think there's an asteroid or something on the way.
Ooooh! Be careful - science rears its ugly head!
God saw everything that he made and called it good. Then he made man? The captain of it all??? The only creation formed with his hands??? Blew his very own perfect breath into this creation??? Come ON people...
Are you asking if God made man? If he made them good?
What she is saying is that man is God's masterpiece. Formed with the hands of God, not spoken into existence like everything else.
An interesting note for those who can see and hear spiritually. One thing God said about man is, "It is not good that man is alone." (paraphrased)Couldn't have said it better myself. Thanks. You know my heart.
Actually, it sounds like my own "masterpieces" (oil paint) - when finished I can always find fault with it. Somewhere it could have been improved.
Would have wished He would have noticed the eyes that wear out way too early, the teeth that no longer fit in the jaw and the propensity for runaway cell growth we call cancer.But you are not God. You cannot do things perfectly.
Maybe you missed my earlier post about Adam being created in the image and likeness of God. God is a spirit and Adam was created as a spirit. No eyes that wore out, no cancer, no sickness of any kind. Sickness and death entered in when Adam disobeyed God and ate the forbidden fruit.
Adam had the ability to go anywhere he chose to go and do anything he wanted to do. He chose toe at the fruit.Yes, I saw the claim, just nothing to back it with. As such it is nothing but an opinion, and an opinion shared by no one else I've ever heard of.
All very unlikely, I'm afraid - not even the ancient peoples made a claim like that one (spirits don't eat fruit, by the way - they are not material, not of this universe, and unable to interact with physical things like that).Wilderness, you were talking about the biblical texts and what people were saying about God, and made a rebuttal about your own oil painting masterpieces, how fault can be found in those. Sir Dent, to respond how he did, is making a point using the same texts everyone was discussing. You can't then say at this point, when he makes and excellent point how your masterpiece isn't like God's "pre sin" masterpieces, that he is saying something without back up. You are discussing a text, and using fair points and you can't suddenly say he can't then use the very text in question to defend the said texts and ideas. That is moving the goal post to win. Its like a last minute fall back people could use all the time, but it doesn't work. He made an excellent point, and you went into another debate. You were giving your own opinion by the way. I like to call this tactic "moving the picnic to a new location" and hoping others don't notice it. Its kind of like a philosophical point, the one you were making about it being possible or not for a perfect God, vs. you, making a masterpiece.
To counter his point effectively, you would need to show how a perfect God would NOT be able to make a perfect creation if he chose to. This is what it was hinging on, seems to me. You can't argue against a worldview that you pick and choose when to throw out certain portions of it as it suits you. Or ignore certain key points.?? To SirDent, the comment was that the only person/thing to ever claim Adam and Eve were non material "spirits", without eyes, is Sir Dent.
Nothing to do with making a perfect creation if He chose to: that part was merely a comment that God Himself indicated Adam was not perfect, just as I comment that my work isn't either.
Two different subjects, then; one that God said Adam was not perfect and one that said Sir Dent made claims (Adam&Eve were spirits, without physical eyes) without evidence to back them as facts.I wasn't even responding to the part about the spirit, and this continues to miss his point about you were comparing God and his creation of Adam and Eve to your oil paintings and how you can point out problems with them later.
I didn't even touch on the part about the spirit.
SIr Dent said
"Maybe you missed my earlier post about Adam being created in the image and likeness of God. God is a spirit and Adam was created as a spirit. "
Wilderness said in response:
"All very unlikely, I'm afraid - not even the ancient peoples made a claim like that one (spirits don't eat fruit, by the way - they are not material, not of this universe, and unable to interact with physical things like that"
Seems pretty clear to me.
If spirits are immaterial, how can a spirit eat it an apple? Unless it was a spirit apple. 9.9 Where in the bible does it say Adam was a spirit before eating the apple? I gotta agree with wilderness here.I didn't even talk about that, and wasn't responding to the part about the spirit.
Gen 1:27 So God created man in his own image, in the image of God created he him; male and female created he them.
Gen 5:1 This is the book of the generations of Adam. In the day that God created man, in the likeness of God made he him;
How do you know spirits have no substance? Who can know the answer?
Unless we are supposed to be discussing something other than what the Bible says, the proof is above. I just checked the forum category, it says The Bible Discussions End Time Prophecy as the last three.The proof is above...IF you accept that "his own image" and "likeness" means identical, made out of material not from this universe. Material that does not follow the rules of our universe, but nevertheless could exist here and interact on an intimate chemical basis with local materials. I do not accept that and would request where you got such information.
As you explain your reasoning, keep in mind that a bronze bust of SirDent is "in his likeness" as well as "in his image". So is a mirror reflection, a painting and a photograph.
I know spirits have no substance the same way you know they have no eyes. I claim it to be true, just as you do, and my claim is just as valid as yours. If you have the right to make unsubstantiated claims from your imagination, I claim the same right.If I was able to breathe the breath of life into that bust, it would be like me. You keep putting words in my mouth (post) by saying I said they did not have eyes.
When Adam ate the forbidden fruit, the whole world changed. Remember the Bible says God created the heavens and the earth. If God created them all, where did the material come from?
Saying you know spirits have nu substance does not make it so. Even light has substance though very little. Likewise dark has substance. Try sitting in a place that is completely void of light and see how much it weighs on you. I have been there and felt the weight of darkness upon me, a physical weight.
You keep forgetting what forum we are in it seems. This thread is about the Bible and discussions should follow along with the Bible.
A question just popped up.
In his own image...
Could it mean the image he came up with of his own imagination (for lack of a better term). I mean that he just spoke and everything else came forth. But Adam was sculpted. My own work...?
Adam was formed from dust. He definitely was of substance; but immaculately put together. No imperfections. The breath of God himself. Made immortal. Made with decision ability. But one choice barred.
I digress...
Made in his own image... Walk with me when/if you will. All invited (but I guess you know )
Edit--- and for "likeness," immortality?
Sounds possible...
Sin brought us all that stuff jonny. But don'chu worry! God's gonna make it right again.
".....for those who can see and hear spiritually...." the classic cop-out whereby you believers think you can win every argument!
it is not about winning an argument. It is all about Jesus Christ and Him crucified.
BS Sir......and you know it. Totally dishonest with your innermost Self.
Call it as you want. You don't have to read it or respond to it. Thanks for calling me a liar.
Cop-out??? Win an argument??? You've gotten it twisted.
The "argument" was won when Christ said, "It is finished." Spirit is the distinguishing FACTor.
A masterpiece? Didn't God put a curse on His 'masterpiece' for not obeying Him and now the entire world is full of evil sinners? Some masterpiece.
Man actually cursed himself when He disobeyed God. He was created to live forever but now pronounced death upon himself and all creatures. God did not curse the man but he did curse the ground (earth). Man was removed from the Garden so he would not eat from the tree of life and end up living forever with all the pain and sickness that sin brought into the world.
So you've never thought about whether God knew what He was doing or not?
Well, obviously you appear to know that answer considering what you're claiming about seeing and hearing spiritually and then telling us spirit does not die.
Failure? He created free will. A free will makes us capable of both good and evil. If not, if evil did not exist, then we wouldn't be truly free. So evil falls on each of us as being the creators of it, because God successfully created what He set out to. The alternative would be either all of us following the 'natural order' blindly with no minds or wills of our own, or no existence at all. The natural world worked fine before free will, with generation after generation of homo sapiens living long, full lives, never once feeling the need for anything more than a simple life living in harmony with nature. The very same capability that gives us our own minds and wills and the capability to create civilizations and science and everything else also made us capable of evil. And our human history shows from that point forward the kind of impact that's had. We've, from that point since, lived in opposition to the natural world rather than living in harmony with it.
So it appears what God set out to do He accomplished perfectly. Now we experience the full brunt of free will by suffering the repercussions of our own actions, as well as the actions of every free willed human who came before, but we also enjoy the successes that come from that same capability. Even now, your capability to call God a failure who's selfish and petty is something you're able to do because of the free will He gave us.I don't think so, but all the Bible prophecies have been fulfilled for the rapture to take place. So many of us who have put their trust in Jesus Christ may see the rapture in our lifetime.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Elephant_cognition
"Elephants exhibit a wide variety of behaviors, including those associated with grief, learning, allomothering, mimicry, play, altruism, use of tools, compassion, cooperation, self-awareness, memory, and language."
"Elephants are thought to be highly altruistic animals that even aid other species, including humans, in distress. In India, an elephant was helping locals lift logs by following a truck and placing the logs in pre-dug holes upon instruction from the mahout (elephant trainer). At a certain hole, the elephant refused to lower the log. The mahout came to investigate the hold-up and noticed a dog sleeping in the hole. The elephant only lowered the log when the dog was gone."Only the Almighty knows that answer,maybe we will die tomorrow.But in light of what is going on in the world ,it's pretty soon sister.
Yeah, there are a lot of parents and other 'grown-ups' who would often make God out to be a kind of boogie man to scare children into behaving. If you're naughty Santa won't bring you presents and God will send you to hell. And I think some religious institutions have done much the same thing for centuries in their attempts to stay in power and control the masses. So I can certainly understand the charged reactions.
But what bugs me is this fairly recent trend where the non-believers viewpoint is upheld as having the intellectual, or even factual, high ground. Where belief or disbelief is often thought to be in direct correlation to your level of knowledge of science. That if you believe in God you just don't understand science or you just have not critically analyzed your beliefs. Nevermind the fact that the majority of the forefathers of science were themselves Christians or the fact that even today there are numerous scholars and doctors and cell biologists and high energy particle physicists who are clearly very intelligent people who have a deep understanding of science, yet maintain their belief in God. Even Einstein believed in a higher power, though not the God of Abraham. And he believed what he did based on what he saw and understood about the universe. Based specifically on the order he saw in the universe. And clearly he had a much better understanding than any of us here. He referred to the same kinds of things you and I have to justify his reasoning, yet you and I making similar statements is just, somehow, illogical or intellectually dishonest.
There's a significant difference between materialism as a scientific approach, which I agree is necessary, and materialism as a philosophy. I like that quote from Lewontin. I've sometimes referred to a similar statement made by Rupert Sheldrake who was trying to get the same point across ....
"The science delusion is the belief that science already understands the nature of reality in principle, leaving only the details to be filled in. This is a very wide spread belief in our society. It's the kind of belief system of people who say, "I don't believe in God, I believe in science." It's a belief system which has now been spread throughout the entire world. But there's a conflict in the heart of science betweeen science as a method of inquiry, based on reason, evidence, hypothesis, and collective investigation, and science as a belief system or a worldview. And, unfortunately, the worldview aspect of science has come to inhibit and constrict the free inquiry, which is the very lifeblood of the scientific endeavor. Since the late 19th century science has been conducted under the aspect of a belief system, or worldview, which is essentially that of materialism, philosophical materialism."
The point I'm constantly trying to get across is that the very same claims often made by non-believers that belief in God hampers scientific progress, which I agree can and does happen, is not limited only to believers in God. The very same thing happens through a purely materialist philosophy. Both can cause one to inject certainty into the equation that justifies removing perfectly reasonable explanations from the table of consideration. It's just as limiting to progress as the alternate viewpoint they're often arguing against, and it can cause one to be just as dismissive of those who believe otherwise.You know when someone is being desperately intellectually dishonest is when they start misrepresenting Einstein.
I am not familiar with Rupert Sheldrake, but I appreciate that quote from him and that is often what I am trying to get others to see. The points are excellent, and I would agree. When you put faith in something that you believe in, it needs to be supported, and the Christian worldview is very much supported by the world we observe, from history to human psychology, and to the science that all sides agree on even. If your belief conflicts with what is known, it may not be the best worldview, and ought to be reconsidered in my opinion. Distorting the views in question is a clue that more is going on. Materialism is very narrow in its scope and can only weigh in on part of what we observe, and only to a point. That is fine if the person maintaining that view admits its limitations, and I say that for myself as well and my own beliefs/views.
Very smart of him to point out the conflict between science as he describes it, and science as a belief system or worldview. It further confuses things when scientists overlap their personally held worldviews with the science they observe and present it all as "science." Generally speaking in our world today, I observe people to not be careful thinkers, or listeners and so this is often missed and/or taken advantage of. (Whether purposeful or not.) Philosophical materialism is a worldview, and nearly becoming a religion, lol.
You're completely missing the point.
First, they have no idea what to make of Gobekli Tepe for one primary reason, this site dates back to 9000 BC or earlier. This predates the Neolithic revolution. In fact, it appears the first domestication of wheat happened in this region. But the fact is it dates back to the hunter-gatherer period where no other structures like this have been found.
But the point is, whether or not the purpose of something is understood is irrelevant to determining whether not something was deliberately created. The pyramids were first discovered centuries ago. Do you think they first had to determine the purpose of these structures before they pieced together that they were made by humans?Well, much like the 'possible reasons' for Stone Henge and other ancient structures, we can only really speculate as to God's purpose. But first we would need to determine what exactly constitutes a 'bad outcome'. "Bad" according to what standard? Do you think death is bad? Do you think sickness and disease are bad? What would be the point in a nerf-world where nothing "bad" ever happens to have a free will? If your biggest decisions were between coke and pepsi? Paper or plastic? Would those choices even exist, would there even be coke or pepsi, if people in the past hadn't been strengthened by the challenges they faced? If there was no sickness would we appreciate good health? Is it not sickness and disease that strengthened our bodies defenses? Is it not predators that made us agile and intelligent? If you really thought these things through I think you'd find that this ideal world that everybody seems to want with no "bad" stuff isn't that great.
If the purpose is to create free will then this world seems the perfect place to me. Life is short, death gives each moment more meaning and purpose and makes what you choose to do in those moments more vital. The possibility of "bad" things give us an appreciation when things aren't "bad". What would we do with our lives if we didn't have challenges to overcome and dangers to face? I just picture big, fat useless blobs. Like the saying goes, "Calm waters do not make good captains". Do you think we should challenge our kids? Or just let them sit idle and handle all their problems and challenges for them? Should we try to prepare them and let them out into the cold, harsh world, or should we shelter them and keep them shut in? Which would you say is the better parent?
I don't necessarily see these things as "bad", or unintended. Living things behaving the way they do is what made us and molded us. It's what made us resilient and builds our character. Like a tree that grows sheltered from the elements, it just grows straight and weak. It's the winds and the storms that breaks the tree and strengthen it and that gives it its beautiful shape.What you are not understanding is that not all design is intelligent. But I see your point and it's worth noting that what we do know is that we typically have an idea what a structure is used for and why it was built. Pillars typically are an artistic features of structure and structures are typically used to house much like a fox den.
What design isn't intelligent? Please provide an example.
I suppose I didn't word that well at all. What I meant was there is bad design with little intelligence.
"Bad" according to what? By what standard do you deem one thing 'bad' and another thing not?
Ok.
That's a whole different story.
If the designer designs SEEMINGLY useless creations, that is a problem of our lack of understanding of the purpose.
It's a long process. With lots of steps. Maybe certain gene sequences are needed further along in the process. That could explain large-scale horizontal gene transfers that don't make much sense other wise.Thanks, you just made my point perfectly. The only way a intelligent designer would make useless creations is because he doesn't understand the purpose.
We seem endless creations that seem to have no purpose, us included.I didn't say the designer didn't know the purpose. I said WE don't.
that's the thing about design, it's purpose is evident.
Obviously not, or there wouldn't be endless debate among acedemics over the purposes of things built by our ancestors.
Structure is either built to house the living or the dead. It's purpose is evident.
Neither applies to Gobekli Tepe. Nobody lived there, and by all appearances nobody was buried there either. You're making these sweeping generalizations as if we know and understand all we have found to date or are aware of. Far from.
"The function of the structures is not yet clear. The most common opinion, shared by excavator Klaus Schmidt, is that they are early neolithic sanctuaries."
I'm not sure what your talking about.Well I hate to spend any time on this at all since this is completely outside the point and is beginning to feel like an argument just for the sake of arguing, but I'll play along ...
"The inhabitants are assumed to have been hunters and gatherers who nevertheless lived in villages for at least part of the year.[29] So far, very little evidence for residential use has been found."
"Schmidt's view, shared by most experts, is that Göbekli Tepe is a stone-age mountain sanctuary. Radiocarbon dating as well as comparative, stylistic analysis indicate that it is the oldest religious site found to date.[7][33][34] Schmidt believes that what he calls this "cathedral on a hill" was a pilgrimage destination attracting worshipers up to 100 miles (160 km) distant."
- http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gobekli_Tepe
But the first line of what you copy/pasted should tell you something. Function not yet clear. Yet there's no one waiting until function is established before deeming this an intelligently created structure.
Then we can scrap the entire field of archeology now. Thank you!
With all due respect everyone here in this Forum, I have become bored and disinterested. There is life for me away from the computer, but if anyone has more expansive and interesting topics they are following, please let me know.
He or she may say something like brain eating amoebas, penis fish and cancers.... (;p)
but its not unintelligent to the amoeba or cancer in those cases, lolI meant that "design" by definition, means it has to by a designer, which infers intelligence.
My apologies, I was being goofy and joking really, based on some of the past conversations.
Right, and when we see order and structure, like coded information broken down into differing but repeating units, or characters, and arranged in a very particular order, we generally think of it as something man-made. Like if you were to see ancient symbols arranged in lines carved into a stone, you might piece together that this appears to be some form of written language, even if you cannot yet decipher what it says. Well we see much the same thing in genetic code. Or when we see a system that serves a specific purpose consistently, you might think this is a machine created by a human to serve this specific purpose. Well we see similar systems in our solar system, in the earth's climate and water cycles, in its seasons, in its ecosystem, etc.
We know things like fox dens are made by foxes to serve a purpose and we know pillars are made by humans to serve a purpose. Well, we see specific purposes served all over the place in organized systems in the natural world as well. In any other case we might deduce that this too was deliberately created to serve a purpose. But not here. In the natural world it's just a system that unintelligently organized itself with no help from any creator. Why? Because we can see the process that formed it, which was also very organized and structured. And the elements that played a role in that process, like atoms or cells, also have organization and structure. Somehow the possibility of any of this being deliberately created cannot even be considered. That's just silly, right? Of course it all just happened haphazardly.Of course it can be considered. Consider it. Just don't expect science to consider it. The problem is you just have no evidence, just wishful thinking a speculation. Humans and other animals seem to order this because it efficient, so when we see order in nature it doesn't mean it was designed, but it does mean it's efficient which makes sense from an evolutionary perspective. From an evolutionary perspective everything makes sense, even the brain eating amoeba. From that perspective we don't need purpose, that's why we don't see purpose.
Let us see everything that is, accept everything that is and leave it at that. That's enchanting enough, I would say.
I don't expect science to consider it, as it falls outside of science's jurisdiction. It would make absolutely no sense to have physical evidence of something that A) isn't material, and B) exists beyond our universe. This is why I have repeatedly made the distinction between materialism as a scientific approach and materialism as a philosophy.
What you don't seem to get is that everyone is in the same boat as far as "wishful thinking and speculation" are concerned. Whatever 'caused' the beginning of this universe happened outside of this universe and is therefore beyond the scope of what's observable/measurable/detectable. Whether you're talking about an intelligent creator or whether you're talking about a multi-verse or a spaghetti monster or whatever else.
Yes, efficiency makes sense from an evolutionary perspective. And both efficiency and evolution make sense from a creator perspective because it's a chaotic, random process that becomes structured and ordered. These are less likely reached through pure haphazard chaos, and are more likely reached through design and deliberate intent. Chaos isn't even chaos in this place, but becomes order. The brain eating amoeba make sense too. You just have it in your mind that it doesn't, which isn't factual or based on anything factual, but rather is based on whatever concept you hold in regards to what deliberate intent should look like.
You keep saying that purpose is evident if intelligently made, but this is clearly not true. The competing theories of Stonehenge alone should make that apparent. Burial remains found at the site do suggest that may have been at least part of its purpose, but the structure alone didn't tell anyone that. Only after remains were found did that become evident. So, clearly, the structure alone did not have an obvious function or purpose. Yet there was never any doubt, because of the configuration of the stones, that this was an intelligently created structure."It would make absolutely no sense to have physical evidence of something that A) isn't material, and B) exists beyond our universe. "
What is it if it is not material? Nothing. That's the problem. And outside our universe? We don't even know that there is an outside, and that is one thing science is interested in.That is the materialist philosophy speaking there. It is as if it "drives the bus" of the person holding it, their thinking anyway. This would be an example of that.
Things that aren't material and exist beyond the universe, is the place you end up when considering origins. I suppose a materialist can deny some of the science we do know of and ignore the origins part, but that is the thing in question here, the most anyway. (The thing on trial here, to see if it is intelligent or not.)'That is the materialist philosophy speaking there. It is as if it "drives the bus" of the person holding it, their thinking anyway. This would be an example of that"
It is not a philosophy, it's the facts of the matter. And yes, facts drive the bus, not speculation. Can you tell me something that exists that is not material? Remember, it has to exist. If it exists we can have evidence for it.
"Things that aren't material and exist beyond the universe, is the place you end up when considering origins. I suppose a materialist can deny some of the science we do know of and ignore the origins part, but that is the thing in question here, the most anyway. (The thing on trial here, to see if it is intelligent or not.)"
lol.. You say things that exist and are beyond the universe as if there are such things and you can show them, and that that there is an outside to this universe. Both those ideas are just ideas without any evidence to back them up.
Science is interested in knowing if there is an outside of this universe but it doesn't even know if that's a rational question to ask yet. That has not stopped people from forming mathematical models of what it might be like but they are models, not fact, and they won't even be testable for perhaps centuries if at all. And yet here you are, sure that there is a beyond and that there are things in it that are not material.
I don't mind speculation as long as people aren't selling it as fact. I'm not the one ignoring science. In fact, I know a little about it.
And why you would think our origins are outside the universe I couldn't guess. That's just so far out in left field...
Until you can show that there is some thing that exists that is not material, that's all we know for sure exists.
And if you know anything about physics and energy/matter, you would know that in theory that's all there is so science has to look for a material natural answer. So far there seems to be no intelligent designer required. Let me know when that changes.To this:
"It would make absolutely no sense to have physical evidence of something that A) isn't material, and B) exists beyond our universe. "
You said:
"What is it if it is not material? Nothing. That's the problem. And outside our universe? We don't even know that there is an outside, and that is one thing science is interested in."
I said that is an example of materialistic philosophy, and something about how it drives the bus of some people's thinking. You said no it wasn't philosophy, it is the facts of the matter. I reposted those quotes, because you said something is nothing, if it isn't material. Yet you don't know that for a fact at all. It is an example of a personally held belief that may totally be wrong, yet presented as fact. You said, "what is it if not material? Nothing." That is working from your held, chosen worldview, and it drives how you think about the rest of many of the things that come up. It limits your ability also to even talk about origins because only certain things are even allowed to be options. I wouldn't find that self imposed limitation satisfying, but it may be fine for some, and may be no problem at all for them. It still is what it is though.You can only work from what is actually known. Working from speculative ideas gets you no where. If we find a reason to think that there is something other than the material world then we will consider it. Until then, show me there is something outside the universe and that something exists that is not material. I'll be glad to accept the facts. Otherwise you are just speculating and that to me is next to worthless.
I think we ARE working from what is actually known. Do you not think Darwin speculated? Does some speculation get you nowhere? Absolutely. It especially doesn't work when it doesn't mirror the known world. The known world and its clues are what are pointing to the immaterial in this particular case. Some have very great faith that something someday that is material will be the answer, but by definition we are talking about a point in time where we have to consider it. This is part of the limiting factor, that need not be limiting for all thinkers out there.
The intelligence that NASA works with for instance, can't be put into a bucket or on a platter to view materially. The ideas I am expressing right now are not coming from anything material. You can't get into someone's brain and say, "ah, there it is!" Yet, it is.
" I reposted those quotes, because you said something is nothing, if it isn't material. Yet you don't know that for a fact at all. It is an example of a personally held belief that may totally be wrong,"
Science has been looking at this question for a long time. What we discovered and found remarkable is that all of this, this earth, you, me, and everything else, is energy/matter in different forms. There really is nothing else that science has found and there has been no need found for there to be anything else.
So unless some evidence comes to light that points to there having to be something else, then there is nothing wrong with saying there is nothing else that we know of.
Christians claim there is but have no evidence to support that claim.
It's like me saying I have invisible pink squirrels in my attic. You would be right to say that there is no such thing because I made it up. I can offer no evidence of them.In fairness to your challenge, you really think the evidences for God and Jesus are the same as those for invisible pink squirrels in your attic? Do you think people believe in God in the same way they would just believe for the same kinds of evidences of invisible pink squirrels in your attic? Is that exaggerated or are you for real?
"In fairness to your challenge, you really think the evidences for God and Jesus are the same as those for invisible pink squirrels in your attic? "
yes.
"Do you think people believe in God in the same way they would just believe for the same kinds of evidences of invisible pink squirrels in your attic?"
yes and no
" Is that exaggerated or are you for real?"
yes to both.Thanks for your honest answers. My response is, that I find it a bit silly to suggest that there are no more evidences for God and Jesus than there are for invisible pink squirrels in your attic. I could even buy that you don't find the evidences compelling for you personally, or something like that. But to say that there are none like there are none for invisible pink squirrels in your attic is super far over the top. They don't have to be good evidences for God, to you personally, to be great evidences for others. Like natural revelation, the Bible, Jesus, their personal experiences, observable science and its possible explanations, answered prayers, reason, logic etc. These things are evidences to people for God, and likely there are more. Now, to the invisible pink squirrels, there isn't ANY good reason for thinking they are there. I almost hesitated responding at all to this one, because of the over the top nature of the claim. Still, there's my answer, and I don't find the two remotely comparable, and not because of my personally held views. I mean because of logic and reason, etc.
Sorry, but there is no reason, logic or observable science in you beliefs, just as there is no hard evidence to back up any of your beliefs, they are strictly beliefs based on faith and have no basis in reality.
Logic and reason dictate that invisible pink squirrels have exactly the same amount of evidence for existence as your God or any other god. There isn't ANY good reason for thinking your God exists.So, according to you, every scientist, past or present, every scholar and doctor, anyone and everyone who has ever believed in God, lacks reason and logic as they believe in something with no basis in reality? What's the more likely scenario, that they're all delusional/illogical/unreasoned, or that your viewpoint is limited and biased? Which is the more fallible element? All of us, or your opinion?
Logic and reason dictate that the God that half the world's population believes in, including roughly 1/3 of the current scientific community, the same God that people throughout history have written about, the same God that texts and temples and everything else have been made for, has way more evidence for existence than these invisible pink squirrels that have no apparent impact on human history.Absolutely.
Obviously, it is delusional/illogical/unreasoned.
Appeal to popularity fallacy, appeal to belief fallacy.Uh-huh, so let me think about this. My options are either to convince myself that everything I think is actually wrong, that Galileo was illogical and delusional, as was Newton and Descartes and Bacon, that Max Planck inexplicably held beliefs with no basis in reality, that the God that Darwin refused to deny was because he too was delusional/illogical/unreasoned, that everyone from cell biologists to particle physicists that believe in God, in spite of their contributions to science because of their grasp of reality, are all deluded as well. Or I could just realize that you have some obvious hang-ups about religion that then distorts your perception and makes you certain of things that clearly aren't true. I choose B. I'll go with the people who actually provided all the information you're now using to justify your beliefs and allow you to say none of it is true and they're all kooks.
"Appeal to popularity/belief fallacy" is just a way for you to justify to yourself ignoring a large percentage of human history so you can make side by side comparisons with invisible squirrels. It's a cop-out. Cover your eyes and wish it all away if you want, but that doesn't mean that's not all still relevant to those of us who are actually interested in real truth, and not just convincing ourselves of what we really, really want to be true.Don't you mean everything you "believe" in regards to your religion? Does that include everything?
Absolutely. Believing in gods is delusional/illogical/unreasoned. Their contributions to science is something entirely different as was the state of the world during those times, a state in which one never states they disbelieve in a god. Funny, how you seem to forget that little gem.
The delusional/illogical/unreasoned worldview of gods has nothing to do with me.
Sorry, I don't hold beliefs. Try again.
No, they are just part and parcel to the array of fallacies you often use in your posts, again, nothing to do with me or invisible squirrels.
Yes, your fallacies are a cop-out, as are any reasons you provide for your faith.
Real truth?So I should be like you, ignore vast amounts of history, convince myself that nearly every major contributor to our modern view of reality was at the same time delusional, or dismiss everything they said regarding God because they were probably just lying, and force myself to look at the evidence only as you see it? You don't even acknowledge where your facts end and your beliefs begin. You just saying you don't hold beliefs doesn't wipe out the loads of statements of yours I've read that say otherwise. I'm sorry, but if your viewpoint were rational and in any way resembled the real world I'd agree with you. If you didn't have to resort to 'fallacy' arguments and blanket assumptions about people to toss out loads of relevant information to get there I might be more inclined to get on board.
Rather than looking at the evidence as only you think he can see it or only you yourself can see it, I suggest looking at the evidence that can been seen or demonstrated.
You mean, should you accept reality? That's entirely up to you. No one is forcing to accept it, it is a decision based on your intellect, honesty and integrity.
Sorry, but the evidence of science is not concerned with your delusional/illogical/unreasoned beliefs.
I hold no beliefs, I'm only interested in facts, which is distinguishable from your delusional/illogical/unreasoned beliefs by reality.
I'm sure you do, most believers operate on belief systems and don't know any different.
You can be as sorry as you want, but my viewpoint is based entirely on reality, facts and evidence, yours isn't.
I doubt that. Until you stop using fallacies as your defense, you'll never be on board.You mean reality as has been defined for the most part by believers? You'd be hard pressed to find anyone who's made a notable contribution to our modern view of reality who wasn't a believer, or who at least acknowledged the potential existence of a higher power. Clearly their beliefs didn't hinder them.
The evidence of science supports my viewpoint just as completely as it supports yours. There's no difference. Only where the facts end and the beliefs/assumptions/philosophy begins do we differ.Once again, you ignore the fact that everyone was once a believer, or at the very least, that's what they said in public. In private, that may have been an entirely different situation.
As well, we are moving from a faith based ignorance to one of reason and logic, part of our evolution.
That is laughable, you have been shown by a number of people here just how wrong you are. Of course, you choose to deny facts and evidence in favor of your religious beliefs, we all know that.
Yes, you support beliefs and assumptions while I support facts. Huge difference.I'm ignoring your statements about these people being closet-atheists because its ridiculous. Yes, you can think like you do if you completely ignore the life's work of each of these people, and instead just make assumptions based in total ignorance. It's not like atheism is some new thing that we've evolved into. Atheism has been around as long as philosophical thought. Each of these people, with few exceptions, went well beyond what you'd suspect a closet-atheist would in their writings and in their lives, and often spoke specifically against atheism. Like Sir Frances Bacon who once said, "It is true, that a little philosophy inclineth man’s mind to atheism, but depth in philosophy bringeth men's minds about to religion; for while the mind of man looketh upon second causes scattered, it may sometimes rest in them, and go no further; but when it beholdeth the chain of them confederate, and linked together, it must needs fly to Providence and Deity." Only someone who knows none of it, or completely dismisses it all based on some blanket assumption, would reach the conclusion you have.
Besides, if we're moving from a faith based ignorance to one of reason and logic, who's to say that's our evolutionary destination? Maybe, rather than being with the times, or even slightly ahead of the curve, you're actually behind? One of the hanger-on-ers who can't let go of their antiquated beliefs and move forward with the rest of us?
Give me just one example of someone showing me that I'm demonstrably wrong. Just one.
Headly, I presume you are speaking of the "god" that is/was/has been/continues to be the instigator/creator of our universe, right? Or are you holding to that idea of the judgmental god that so many are afraid of?
Hey Jonny, I keep meaning to respond to your earlier post, but keep getting distracted.
I'm talking about a creator God. In the terms of the physical evidence of this world I see ample evidence to suggest an intelligent creator was involved. So those are the terms I'm speaking in. I'm trying to get across that EncephaloiDead doesn't have the intellectual or factual high ground like he seems to think he does.
As far as judgement is concerned, at least the way I look at it, God judges in much the same way nature judges, or evolution judges. We tend to think of it in human terms, like it's opinion that deems one worthy and another not. Judgement in this regard has to do with having our own minds and wills. If we are truly free of will then both acceptable and unacceptable behavior must be possible. Acceptable being wills/minds that are not fixated on the selfish and thus taking away from the system they belong to, but who are willing participants in a community who is selfless and helps serve the needs of the rest of the community.
I hope that makes sense. I think the concepts man-made religion has concocted really confuse matters on the whole judgement thing.
What you describe is an example of how people believe in something a lot less likely to be true, and give reasons for it. It is a lot more likely that the suggestions being made are what explains it, than another person's point of view, which could be fallible. No one in their right mind things the pink squirrels exist, yet this seems to be being suggested as a good argument. Believing in things and reasoning in ways that have at their base things that are unreasonable, or illogical is a sign that the view may not be a better view.
There is exactly the same amount of evidence for invisible pink squirrels as there is for the Christian god. Someone even left me a book about them when I moved in. I was told to leave them peanuts once a week or bad things would happen. And guess what? When the last recession hit I lost my job and so did my wife, then when I got a job she was diagnosed with artery disease and has not been able to work since. I guess I should have heeded the warning.
The point is there is no evidence for god or my squirrels. What people claim is evidence could have several other explanations. Testimony from believers is not worth anything because the mind is capable of making itself believe anything and then attributing things that happen to what it believes in.
God is a model that is created to explain the facts of our human condition. But a model does not have to be accurate to be useful. It will always seem as if there is evidence for it because it contains the facts it is supposed to explain. But that doesn’t make the model a representation of reality.
A lot of scientific models are useful but we already know they don’t actually completely reflect reality.
So unless your god shows up and says hi, or you find some other evidence which has no other corresponding natural explanation and could mean anything else but god, there remains as much evidence for god as for my pink squirrels.
That is of course unless you have some actual evidence you want to share?
But you never did answer the original topic did you?What exactly would evidence of God look like? Do you know what to look for? Or, to put it another way, what is it that's not in the evidence that leads you to the conclusion that there is "no evidence for God"? Are we looking for something that lacks 'natural explanation'? So is the idea that if it were God things would just 'poof' into existence inexplicably? Wouldn't the lack of a 'natural explanation' simply be considered something we don't understand yet? We have no 'natural explanation' for the origin of the universe. So does that mean that counts as evidence in favor of God? Or is that just something else we don't understand yet? Is there anything that would actually qualify short of a giant thumb print on the moon?
What evidence would you accept for invisible pink squirrels? I have heard noises but I have found no pink poop which stands to reason if they are invisible.
Perhaps if I could make them visible?
Short of a god actually showing itself? Something irrefutable like god poop I suppose.
It doesn’t have to even show itself, though that would be nice. I’m sure an omnipotent being can make itself known in no uncertain terms to even the most sceptical. What kind of a god would it be if it couldn’t? But since it doesn’t you will have to think of something.
If we could all interact with it like in the real world it would be a no brainer.
But we can’t. It’s an invisible pink god living outside the universe, unable to or unwilling to be seen by all unless we first believe it exists.
Sounds fishy to me. Why should I have to believe it exists first before I can know it is real? That’s ass backward.You're the one that just made the claim. You said there is no evidence for God. I'd like you to explain how you reached that absolute conclusion. Based on what parameters?
Based on no one being able to come up with any. I just told you what would convince me. read my reply again
I didn't make a claim. You did. I'd like to know how you can say there's no evidence for God when you don't even know what would constitute as evidence.
Christians claim there is a god. You included. It is up to you to provide proof for it. I already told you that all the evidence people give could be explained in other ways besides god so no real evidence exists that proves god.
He has to show up and he doesn't, can't or won't. The only way you can know if all the so called evidence you think there is for god, actually is for god, is if it shows up and we all get a look at it.
That's why I picked invisible pink squirrels as an example. You can't see them even if they are in front of you. I could have picked fairies. Lots of people believe in them but there is zero evidence for them.
And again, the idea that you have to believe in it for it to show itself is so absurd it's unbelievable that anyone would fall for that nonsense in this day and age. It's a typical con.
So your god is just a model without substance.
Most theists admit they can not prove a god exists and that the only evidence is subjective, You need objective evidence like god poop
God, of course. No other evidence would suffice. It's like that with all things.
What does God look like? That way, you will know when you see him, and we wouldn't want to miss that, would we?
What does an uncaused cause, that is intelligent, that is described as spirit, and eternal (among many other things....) look like? Would the god in question be limited to our finite minds and a material worldview? How could that be?
By necessity, he would be capable of pulling off all of this, and would therefore not be limited to anything within it. I mean for example, he wouldn't need to be limited by someone human's definition of what they want him to be or behave in ways they insist he must in order to exist. Yet we see that almost everyday in these threads. It is as if god isn't allowed to exist unless he caters and submits to their held worldview, which so often is material, or natural only. (Only matter and observable stuff that is approved of, is ok. If not, then there isn't a god, and we just have faith that material stuff and processes or intelligence with no agency as being sufficient enough before the big bang, to pull off "what we see and are.")
Never mind he did show up anyway in his Son, and that is one thing I don't "get", when people want god to jump through what turns out to be personal hoops, and "come to tea" or else not be allowed to exist. That will show him! (Yes, I did really see someone say that would be evidence enough.) Never mind Jesus addressed this kind of skepticism and answered it, and also spoke of those that believe and didn't get to see proofs first hand. Point being, that those that did see so much, still rejected for other reasons, which Jesus also addressed and the apostles. Its often not about proof at all, or sufficient proof, even though people talk kind of big. Speaking in general here to lots of posts here.Evidence is shown daily to those who will see.
Psa_19:1 To the chief Musician, A Psalm of David. The heavens declare the glory of God; and the firmament sheweth his handywork.
Psa_97:6 The heavens declare his righteousness, and all the people see his glory.
Just for the record of those who doubt.I would suspect that no one knows. Do you?
Are you saying you have seen God? Tell us all what God looks like so we may all know.
Described as spirit? What's that? People are intelligent, does that mean they are gods? Sorry, but nothing has ever shown to be eternal.
All God has to do is show himself, no more limits.
You have just provided an argument for God's non-existence. Well done.
And, you know that for a fact, how? Because the Bible told you?
You can say the same thing about invisible pink squirrels.
How do you even know Jesus existed? The Bible told you?1Co 2:9 But as it is written, Eye hath not seen, nor ear heard, neither have entered into the heart of man, the things which God hath prepared for them that love him.
1Co 2:10 But God hath revealed them unto us by his Spirit: for the Spirit searcheth all things, yea, the deep things of God.Is there some point to those verses? It certainly doesn't show God if that's the point.
Someone asked you what evidence of God would look like, and you said,
"God, of course. No other evidence would suffice. It's like that with all things."
That seemed like a non-answer, so I asked what does God look like. I was hoping to get you to think about it, since you didn't really answer what evidence for God would suffice for you.It is an answer, not a non-answer. The only evidence for God's existence is God. The only evidence for unicorns is unicorns. Do you understand?
I recommend reading a post thoroughly, and responding with more detail and pertinence if you want to have an interesting debate.
If you are here just to insult people who's beliefs you disagree with, people will eventually just start ignoring you.Sorry, are you talking to me? I did not insult anyone, so please stop fabricating falsehoods.
Ok. I see now that you haven't repeatedly insulted people's intelligence for believing in God. I apologize for my mistake.
All great questions/points, that need to be answered, especially if there was the same amount of evidence for the inv. pink squirrels as God.
There is. The only evidence that can prove a god exists is a god showing itself. Same as evidence required for my squirrels. Objective evidence.
Which is another way of saying what I have been saying, that for God "to be allowed" to exist, has to be observed materially, and in a manner we specify. Or else, there is no evidence for him. While ignoring he did reveal himself through his son Jesus or discounting that as a method of showing up. That is another discussion, proof of that. For this discussion, you can't say God hasn't shown himself or shown up, at least in that way.
The answers given were God has to show up, or the equivalence of squirrel poop. This is not sincere attempt at debate, especially when considering what the being would have to be going by science we all know and agree on, or by the revealed word of God in the bible. The very being in question or god, is by default (going by your specifications) not even allowed to enter into the realm of possibility. THUS, making the answers the questions I was responding to, a must, in the sense that they must be answered. That they can't be or want to be ignored, is another sign of belief to me, and this rigid setting of the rules so that god will fail the test if he exists. Anyone can set the rules as such. Purposeful or not, or a copycat idea from others or not, its good for people to expose it for what it is. Setting up for what could never be, is something then chosen, not reflective of the facts we know of or logic or reason.There are only two kinds of evidence, subjective and objective. All things that exist leave objective evidence. Things that do not, do not leave objective evidence. Subjective evidence is ok for the individual but proves nothing to anyone else. If god exists there should be objective evidence if you expect anyone but a believer to say it exists.
No one is saying a god of some sort does not exist. Thousands of them have books written about them too and testimony. But you don't believe they exist and rightly so. No real evidence. Same with your god I'm afraid. No difference.
You can twist and turn any way you like and say it is not fair. That's the way it is.In my mind there's this elaborate art rock concept album that I've dreamt about and have been composing for years. It's most definitely there. It most definitely exists. I can hear it. Yet there's not objective evidence that it exists. What about your memories? Or your dreams? They're real, right? They exist because you experience them. They're part of your reality. Even though there's no objective proof that they're real.
All those things are subjective. They are as YOU experience them. They aren't necessarily real. You may have an album cover in your head, or the composition for a song you want to write, but no one else will know anything about it until that image is put on paper, and that song is played with an instrument. or as technology is advancing, we'll soon be able to see them through computer reconstructions of your brain activity, so one day we may able to hear your song or see your album cover. With the right physical tools.
Memories are not "real" and shouldn't be trusted as much they are. They exist for you in your mind, but 9 times out of 10, you're going to remember an event with limited perspective depending on your emotional state, frame of mind, and what it meant to you. One's ability to see things objectively determines how accurate one's memories will be, and even then you'll still have limited perspective. Or something extremely traumatic may be quite vivid for you. However, again with the brain imaging thing, at some point we may even be able to see what happened from your perspective.
Dreams are not real. But your mind makes them out to be ( to an extent as I've died in a dream before, still woke up). but let's look at someone who is schizophrenic, They see people, interactive with them, touch them, may even smell them, they have vivid experiences with people that aren't even there. It's very real to them. But do they exist outside of their own minds? No. Now you can choose to believe those people did see who they thought they saw and did experience what they thought they experienced. But those are not things that can be objectively observed.They do exist because the mind exists. And it has a very real impact on the real world. Skyscrapers started as an idea. Books, music, art. These all began as ideas, yet became real. The simple fact that something does in fact exist, that we know exists, yet cannot be objectively observed or measured, means there are things in this universe that are not observable, yet exist. The only reason we know about the mental experience is because we experience it. The only reason we can experience the mind is because we actually experience the physical brain. To the outside observer it's just firing neurons and oxygenated blood. But to the individual it's so much more. What are the chances that the only lump of matter we each personally experience is the only thing that has more going on than what outside appearances would suggest?
Again, all of those things only matter because they were put down on paper and/or constructed. Otherwise you may experience something, but unless I have the proper tools to observe that something, what makes it "real?" Now, if you write your story, or you make your song, or paint your painting, and I can see it and hear it, it is no longer intangible nor is it not observable. Now I don't have to take your word for it. I can see it. I can experience it.
Again, back to schizophrenia, do you think that their experiences are real, even though no one else can see/experience those people (or whatever they're seeing)? I may even be able to see a projection of who they see one day with brain mapping as again that's where technology is leading. Does that mean the person now exists because I'm seeing their mind's projection of that individual? What about people who are taking hallucinogens and experience some pretty loopy stuff. Should I take their word for it that whatever they imagined was real? I'm sure we could reconstruct their experience, or they may even write stories or paint paintings of what they saw. Does that make it "real?" Or an experience or visual that the brain created while under the influence.
You'd have to start redefining "real" and "exist."Yes those things exist because they are real causes for the actions and behaviors of humans. They're the unseen causes behind the resulting effects that humans do. All things need a cause, right? Yet most of what causes human behavior is unseeable and undetectable. But that doesn't mean the impact they have on the world is any less real. Love and fear are intangible, yet have a very real impact on the world. Memories, whether accurate or not, can still cause a result in someone's behavior. In fact, whether or not that memory is accurate can change the outcome. So what happens to that intangible memory, whether or not it distorts, can even have an impact.
Let's say I see a pink squirrel telling me to murder my mother. Like it tells me lies, and it convinces me that my mom is like the most evil of evil scum, and I kill her, then the pink squirrel exists because I killed my mother? No. It IS true that I believed there was a pink squirrel, and that I believed it told me things. My experience was very real to ME. But does that mean that there really was a pink squirrel telling me to do those things? Or that my faulty brain was creating some crazy/twisted scenarios?
No matter the scenario, the fact remains that your intangible mind caused real results. To the outside world it's another story of a daughter who flipped out and did something horrible. But to you it was that damn squirrel that lied to you and tricked you. Whatever the case, something that only existed in your mind was the 'cause' that resulted in such a tragic result. Would you have done the same, in this scenario, if the squirrel didn't exist in your mind and tell you what it did? If not then that intangible talking squirrel IS the cause.
My question is does that intangible talking squirrel in my mind exist only because it exists in my mind? Because I think that's the only things being argued when it comes to God. No one's saying you didn't have your experiences. I certainly had my "experiences." What we are asking is that just because you had your experiences and they caused you to do stuff, does that mean that God really exists, or that He only exists in your mind and your projection of Him is what leads your actions? If it's enough for anything to exist simply because you experience it as being real, then we better be ready for Pandora's box to open. Maybe literally.
The primary point here is that the mind is something we know for certain exists, it's something that has a real impact on the real world, yet it doesn't fit into the material box. So, it stands to reason it's not the only thing that does in fact exist, yet isn't material. It's the difference between materialism as a scientific method of inquiry and materialism as a philosophy. When you're practicing the scientific method a materialist mentality is essential because it guides what can be tested and objectively observed through the physical sciences. But when adopted as a philosophy it tends to limit people's thinking by causing them to reject anything immaterial as 'not real'. When we know for certain there's at least one thing in existence that doesn't apply to. What's material is only what "can be shown to the five sense" as oceansnsunsets put it. If we allow ourselves to think that's all there is then that's all we're ever see, whether it's actually true or not.
The human brain isn't material? What makes you think that? The chemicals and electrical impulses are not measurable? Do drugs not alter the mind? Does a brain injury not alter the mind? Does sleep deprivation not alter the mind? Does brain surgery not alter the mind?
The brain most definitely is material. And yes, physical/chemical changes to the physical brain can have an impact on the immaterial mind. But that doesn't mean the mental experience is material. We still can't observe it. We just know it's the product of a physical brain and its functions. But it's not observable/measurable/quantifiable.
Observable?
MRI's show thought and the brains thought is rather well mapped out. A damaged brain effects thought. These things are observable.
Measurable?
IQ tests measure the ability of ones mind.
Quantifiable?
MRI's show us where specific brain activities come from. IQ test's measure the abilities of and individuals mind.
Nope, nope the mind exists. That isn't the argument. No one argues about whether or not the mind exists except maybe philosopher? This is only arguable when you separate the mind from the brain. If there's a brain, there's a mind because the word "mind" is simply a word we gave to categorize certain functions of the brain. The question is whether or not projections of the mind are to be considered real when there's nothing outside of the mind to concretely verify them.
The mind can be defined as:
1. seat of thought and memory: the center of consciousness that generates thoughts, feelings, ideas, and perceptions, and stores knowledge and memories.
2. thinking capacity: the capacity to think, understand, and reason
All this is taking place in the brain, and with MRI's we can show you where. The brain is very real.
The capacity of that mind/brain is different based on the functions/evolution/health of the brain. For instance, someone might have severe damage to their pre-frontal cortex. They then lose somewhat their ability to inhibit their speech and actions, the loss dependent upon the amount of and location of the damage. Their mind now has limited functioning because their brain has limited functioning. Same with an Alzheimer's patient. Their brain is disappearing, and their cognitive/physical functions go with it.
The question is still if something that happens in the mind/brain real simply because that person is convinced that they experienced it? Is the pink squirrel real because I experienced it in a "real" way? Even if a computer screen can one day project the image of that squirrel that I see so that anyone else can, is it anymore than a projection of my mind? Or does that squirrel exist because I experienced it as being real? Even if without the computer generated projections I convinced other people and now they see it too, will their projections of the squirrel be real? Will they look like mine? Will it be more validated because they see the squirrel in their minds now, too?
One very real difference (and pardon me for joining this late, I hope I'm not saying something that has already been covered or is not germane to the discussion) is that ONLY YOU saw the pink squirrel. Thousand, hundreds of thousands, MILLIONS of people have some kind of God experience. To say that the pink squirrel was a hallucination is based on the fact that only one person experienced it. To say that God is a figment/hallucination/psychosis (and I've personally been accused of all three within these forums, so it ain't hyperbole) seems to boil down more to the need of someone who hasn't had the experience to quantify the PEOPLE rather than the EXPERIENCE. And, like so many other experiences where the people get quantified rather than the event, it usually dehumanizes whoever is on the other side.
Should we then take it for granted that those who suffer from mental illness are really hearing real voices because it happens to so many?
Sounds like an appeal to inappropriate authority.That is a logical fallacy. Don't put words in my mouth or interpret what I say to suit whatever you want it to mean. I don't deny that there is genuine mental illness and I never, ever have. But I also don't hold with couch potato Freuds who want to classify anyone who has had any kind of God experience as mentally ill. They don't understand God and they don't understand schizophrenia.
I understand them well enough to know that my particular experience, which is usually mischaracterized by those who accuse me of schizophrenia in any case, does not fit the template for it. Nor do the experiences of most of those who have had them.
Two things.
Just because someone uses mental illness in an explanation doesn't mean they are insinuating that you have a mental illness.
It's funny how everyone with these experiences are convinced that their experiences are the true ones.So who insinuated? The tone was far and away more accusatory than implicit.
Sometimes I think you want an actual conversation, then you do this...
...and this...
If ED is the voice of predictability does that make you the voice of condescension?I get it. You don't want to have a conversation, you want to tell us you are right and if anyone comes up with any alternative there is something wrong with them. What's wrong with me pointing out where Newton went wrong? What's wrong with me or anyone else pointing out that you may be wrong? Expect to be told you have it wrong and make a defence rather than complaining and calling us names.
That attacks the persons and not the subject matter. If you're incapable of addressing the subject matter, you attack the person, instead.
The conversation that me and Headly were having was slightly different. It had more to do with the mind and it's projections than specifically "what if I believed in a Pink Squirrel" flying spaghetti monster type thing. But I'll post a portion of one of my responses to him here.
By your reasoning, why should we specifically believe in the Christian God? Or are you saying that Christian experiences are the only valid ones. With what authority? Because it's real to YOU? How ethnocentric. Should I believe you because there are lots of people who agree with you? There are lots of people who don't and who have their own experiences. Why should I believe yours over theirs?
Is that what you're doing?
additional note: Christianity was certainly not the first organized religion. And it didn't necessarily get so widespread through peace and butterflies (and always voluntarily).A danger I run when dropping into and out of these conversations as I do.
No, that's not what I said. What I said, what I meant was that we should stop dismissing God experiences just because we don't have them. And the emphasis on Christian was not mine. I think about all this stuff and I think about what Muslims experience and Hindus, and why.
Little touchy, are we? Ethnocentric? Christianity is now an ethnicity? Besides, and again, the emphasis on Christianity is not mine. I'm not saying anything here that I haven't said before, and hopefully someday you'll hear what I'm actually saying.
Here's a hint: no, it's not what I'm doing...
Since I haven't been here for a while, I guess maybe I need to remind people that I actually AM the history buff around here. I've been accused of misapplying and even ignoring history before but if you actually read my stuff, you know that's not true.I used to have "God experiences." I'm no longer convinced that they were actually "God experiences." But I did have them. They left along with my change in perspective. Or rather they left because of my change in perspective. (Stuff still happens, I just don't credit it to God because along with many other reasons, I don't think I'm special enough for such silly things to be a gift from God to me when there are people everywhere going through worse sh*t and dying in the midst of it)
But are you saying that you believe that there are legitimate experiences that aren't Christian that aren't simply the Devil because they're different?
Not at all.
In Anthropology, the word is used when observing a different culture and making judgments about that culture based on the perspective of your own. Of course that's what I'm doing (though I dismiss them all because from a natural perspective religion has purpose but no validity without any testable evidence). But really, this fact renders these types of conversations mostly moot at the end of the day because unless something major happens to change one's mind both sides will always essentially be talking two different languages.
Oh, ok. So that's a yes to other people's God experiences being legit even if they aren't Christian?
History from a Christian or Secular perspective? (I'm asking because I really don't know) I'm currently taking a history class with a Professor that's a Presbyterian minister and it's like being in Sunday school...
It's one thing to look at History from a secular perspective:
These religious experiences were real and important to the people of the time/region. Religion was a useful means for survival, though we don't specifically adhere to them (or we do adhere to one, but we'll teach you like we don't). Look at everything from natural bird eye perspective.
VS a Christian perspective:
These religious experiences were real and important to the people, but you've got to be sure to mention they were actually tricked by the Devil and Christianity is the only one that got it right (because it's possible for someone to get it right). Look at everything from Christian's bird eye perspective.I've long said that I believe non-Christian peoples experience(d) something. It doesn't necessarily make it God, but it's not nothing.
Secular v. Christian history? Both. Although I certainly look at things through a Christian lens that doesn't mean I judge everything the way that some do. I actually have greatly enjoyed Hardcore History by Dan Carlin (it's a podcast, I download it through iTunes.) The lectures can be four or more hours but they are really good. And it's not religious.
Related, I do like to listen to historical perspectives that are different, but I don't take them strictly at face value.
Learned something I didn't know! (About ethnocentric.) Thanks!Everyone's experiencing something. The argument is whether or not that experience is real and why or why not? You're still ultimately saying that true Christians aren't just experiencing God, but are the only one's correctly interpreting their experiences. Find that to be a stretch. That's what all religions believe. (Except in Hinduism, all paths lead to the same place, so it's ok if you're not Hindu)
At this point, I'm not going that far. What I AM saying is the tendency to dismiss claims of some kind of supernatural experience more often than not boils down to a materialist viewpoint. The blessing, or the curse depending on your point of view, is that I'm able to see both sides of the issue. The downside is that I'm not able to resolve both sides. There is no synthesis here, it is one or the other. However, what I am pursuing is truth, not an agenda, and I've realized that things must be dialed back, and I don't just mean the rhetoric levels or the emotion, I mean we need to strip things down to a basic level and start asking questions.
So yes, I certainly have brought a Christian 'bias' to the table in the past but at this point I'm trying to explore things on a much more basic and general level. I don't emphasize Christianity, at least not for the purposes of this particular discussion.So, either you're claiming to be special or you can explain what a "blessing or curse" has to do with anything?
Supernatural experiences are dismissed because there is no evidence for them and instead, they have found in those cases mental disorders."Supernatural experiences are dismissed because there is no evidence for them..."
So there is no evidence attained through the 'natural sciences' for anything 'SUPER-natural'? So, how exactly would you determine something to be 'super-natural' anyway?That is exactly the question we ask believers who claim the supernatural. How do they know?
Claiming that something is supernatural is to claim that it is attributed to some force beyond scientific understanding or the laws of nature. This is where even our greatest minds screw up. God done it. No need to look any further, no need to find out why, we know why, God did it.
Right, I get that. What I'm trying to point out is that it doesn't make any sense to say 'no evidence of the supernatural has been found'. If there were evidence that would mean that a 'natural cause' has been determined, thus not supernatural. If a 'natural cause' is not established it's not like that is then deemed supernatural. That is just looked at as something we don't understand yet. Like the beginning of the universe beyond that singularity. To date there is no 'natural cause' explanation. So does that mean that's evidence of the supernatural? No. That's just something we haven't found the 'natural cause' for yet that we assume has to be there, right?
Right, so claiming something to be supernatural without attempting to find a natural reason is premature.
Yes, I agree. And saying no evidence of the supernatural has ever been found is illogical.
Is it illogical to claim that the bible is evidence for the supernatural? There are lots of evidence for the supernatural, just no good sound evidence. A lot of people make claims.
Because the bible is man-made, it too is a product of the human mind and falls into that same subjective category. The bible, along with any other ancient text, can reveal itself to be accurate in knowledge gained after the fact. As I often point out, I think it shows a knowledge of earth's history beyond what any human could know before this age, and I think it gives an accurate depiction of real events that are reflected in the evidence in the given age and region. So in that way I think it can be evidence of the supernatural. Or it could be evidence that the people of that age were much more knowledgeable than we thought, but not necessarily informed in a 'supernatural' way. Being subjective, it can be interpreted differently. It can be argued until the end of time with no hope of ever being resolved with objective certainty. Much like philosophy and psychology and anything else that crosses the boundary line of the material/natural sciences, when it comes to truths about the mind and anything else there may be that's immaterial, it's all about your philosophy. In philosophy you can use objective facts to guide, but not to fully resolve.
So you feel the bible is evidence of the supernatural?
Technically, no. As I said, it can show itself to be accurate in light of knowledge gained after the fact, but even that doesn't necessarily prove a supernatural element. It could just mean the people of the bronze age were much more informed than we thought.
The evidence we know about the region and time frame is consistent with a hypothesis of mine that most definitely has a supernatural element involved, and that hypothesis was formed using the bible. And that hypothesis could potentially be proven or disproven. But interpretation of the bible is subjective, so it cannot objectively prove much of anything.Evidence doesn't have to prove anything. Evidence doesn't have to be right. For instance, scripture the only evidence that Jesus even lived. There is also omitted scripture that is evidence that Jesus was married. Not the bible describes many supernatural miracles, so it's in fact evidence of the supernatural. One just has to decide if it's compelling evidence, just as one has to decide if the Quran or The Book of Mormon is factual.
That 'scripture' was not 'omitted.' Literature that shows a radically different Jesus than the one shown in the Gospels (whether you believe them or not) cannot co-exist side by side. The fact is that if the Arians had carried the day, people would today be talking about the 'omitted' literature that showed Jesus 'wasn't married.'
Regarding scripture being the only evidence that Jesus lived, that's not true. The Quran alone mentions Jesus in like 90 something verses I think it is.
"Most modern scholars of antiquity agree that Jesus existed,[1][2][3] but scholars differ on the historicity of specific episodes described in the Biblical accounts of Jesus,[4] and the only two events subject to "almost universal assent" are that Jesus was baptized by John the Baptist and was crucified by the order of the Roman Prefect Pontius Pilate.[5][6][7] Biblical scholars and classical historians regard theories of his non-existence as effectively refuted.[8][9][10]" - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Historicity_of_Jesus
The bible does describe supernatural miracles, but these, being supernatural, cannot be tested. But what we can do is match up events to what's described. Again, that doesn't 'prove' supernatural happenings, but does give credence to the text if accurate.
But yes, you're right, evidence doesn't have to prove anything. For instance, the same evidence that supports the materialist viewpoint also supports my viewpoint, though I am not a materialist. Further evidence learned can give credence to one hypothesis that attempts to make sense of the evidence over another.Did you just say scripture is not the only evidence for Jesus because he is mentioned in scripture a lot? (Scripture being the "Sacred writings of religions")
Haha... yes I did. Good catch. I meant biblical scripture.
Let's not use the Quran and other writings that used the bible when writing there own stories. I have a book around here somewhere that was written about Christ, should I use that as evidence for his existence?
Further that was an appeal to authority.Thank you for that. I wasn't familiar with half of what was on that list.
You're right, bad example. Though technically the Quran used the books of Moses as it was said to be a prophecy to correct the changes that had happened over time, so it's not like the references to Jesus were taken from the 'new testament' texts. But as SirDent pointed out above, there are a number of references to Jesus outside of both the NT and the Quran. Roman and Jewish historians, most notably Josephus, made reference to him in no uncertain terms, often as an actual figure who lived and had died at the hands of the Romans. And as that hub also points out, most scribes and historians in that day weren't really interested in the happenings of the poor, so for Jesus to be mentioned as a reference point familiar to their contemporary readers goes to show the amount of impact his life had, as most of these writings were dealing with government and upper class topics.
Except that's not exactly true. Many scholars think that josephus was a forgery, the only question is how much of a forgery is it?
Most of the extra biblical texts refer to Christians, and are examples of those Christians explaining what it is that they believe, as in the case of Tacitus and others. All that aside, none were contemporary. Not even the gospels are contemporary.
The fact that a lot of biblical scholars agree that jesus existed is really not surprising, given the fact that most biblical scholars are Christian. There is a rising skepticism about the historicity of Jesus, and its a subject that is gaining traction in the secular scholar community. While I cannot say with certainty that jesus didn't exist nor would I even assert that it's more likely that he didn't, I think reading about the evidence for his historicity is fascinating.I know that the uncertainty regarding what Josephus wrote is specific to one particular piece that actually speaks of Jesus appearing to his followers after death and exhibiting powers, but the other references are not in contention, like his mention of Jesus, further specified as "the one called Christ", in relation to his brother James, who the writing was actually talking about. And while those other predominately Roman sources are speaking about Christians, they also refer specifically to the one they follow, with one in particular speaking of him being crucified.
That hub SirDent linked to is a really good read on the topic.Headly -
that's not true at all. The Testimonium Flavianum is the most controversial and debated part of the Jewish Antiquities.
Josephus was known as "Flavius Josephus" from his patrons the Flavian emperors, Vespasian and his sons Titus and Domitian. Testimonium Flavianum means literally "Testimony of Flavius" and refers to Antiquities 18.3.3 §63-64:
Now there was about this time Jesus, a wise man, if it be lawful to call him a man, for he was a doer of wonderful works, a teacher of such men as receive the truth with pleasure. He drew over to him both many of the Jews, and many of the Gentiles. He was the Christ, and when Pilate, at the suggestion of the principal men among us, had condemned him to the cross, those that loved him at the first did not forsake him; for he appeared to them alive again the third day; as the divine prophets had foretold these and ten thousand other wonderful things concerning him. And the tribe of Christians so named from him are not extinct at this day.
Unlike Josephus' shorter reference to Jesus, this passage is extremely controversial. Indeed, even McDowell admits this when he writes that the Testimonium Flavianum is "a hotly-contested quotation."[26] Most scholars suspect there has been at least some tampering with the text on the basis of some or all of the italicized sections. Thus scholarly opinion can be divided into three camps: those who accept the entire passage as authentic; those who reject the entire passage as a Christian interpolation into the text (perhaps authored by the fourth-century church historian Eusebius); and those who believe that the original text contained an authentic reference to Jesus but was later embellished by Christian copyists.
http://infidels.org/library/modern/jeff … l#josephus
http://www.patheos.com/blogs/crossexami … le-source/
http://freethoughtblogs.com/carrier/archives/2946
unfortunately, I don't have the time at the moment to go looking through my notes or notebooks or books for future references. Leave it to say that Josephus is debated, non-contemporary and contested in the field of biblical scholarship.For people genuinely curious about this topic, you can do a comparison study for yourself that is very telling about this topic of sources that wrote about Jesus.
The emperor Tiberius compared to Jesus, and how many non christian sources write about each one within 150 years of their lives. Tiberius lived at the same time. It will open your eyes to the truth of this stuff.Yeah, about that. You may want to choose a different example, because even Christian apologists are refuting the comparison, as well as many secular historical scholars
http://freethoughtblogs.com/carrier/archives/2689
http://adversusapologetica.wordpress.co … ce-slogan/I am just saying, do your own research, and the 10-42, or whatever (as I clicked those links) is not the statistic I heard or was referring to anyway.
Nothing wrong with people doing their own research, is there? That is all I was suggesting. I think its a wise thing to do. No one could fault anyone for that. People can search for themselves, to see what they honestly find, with an open mind.
You would expect there to be a lot on Tiberius, after all, and not so much, especially the "hostile witnesses", for a no name guy from Nazareth "that people just made up" for personal gain of some kind.
As for choosing a different example, I think that is actually a very excellent thing to suggest as well so thanks for that.see, that's the thing though. A lot of Christians want to play both sides of the fence. They want to say that there is more evidence for Jesus than Tiberius, or any other ancient figure - take your pick. A lot of people say Julius Caesar or Alexander the great in these comparisons. When they are shown otherwise, they revert back to "well, you wouldn't expect much about a no-name guy from Nazareth.". It's a win-win proposition for a lot of apologists, playing both sides like that.
I think it's an excellent idea to examine the evidence for Jesus and other historical figures. It's part of what led me to where I am now. What I think is a little disturbing is that it is so often taken for granted that he DID exist. It comes down to playing both sides of the fence again. Apologists want you to believe that Jesus was a radical who changed the world in a few short generations, and that he was well known and well documented. When that seems to hard a task, they fall back on the 'well he was relatively unknown in his time, and who would pay attention to a radical jew anyway?" excuse. If the gospels are to be believed, the entire city of Jerusalem turned out to see him ride a donkey through town - and then, with a little bit of spirited cheerleading from the Pharisees were calling for his execution a week later. There are other messiah figures that appeared randomly in historical sources. Messiah figures were not all that uncommon in first-century Judea. But I find it remarkable that of all the historians in and around Jerusalem around the time of Jesus' ministry - several of which who took an interest in miracle workers and astrological signs - that none of the contemporaries mentioned this strange teacher who was performing miracles up and down the coast, raising the dead, clearing the temple and his remarkable (and illegal) trial and execution.
I am never going to say that a historical Jesus never existed. I don't think it's possible to know. But I think research into the subject is important for people on both sides of the issue - including examining sources from both sides, because (with many things) the truth lies somewhere in the middle between the two extremes.I am glad you are open to researching it fairly if you are, that is wonderful. I think we all should.
As for discounting the mention of the fact he wasn't well known, he really wasn't. He was "in the public," doing the things you mention for only three years before they crucified him and tried to guard the dead body, etc. (There are some interesting details surrounding that too) Taking all things into consideration, to me it IS truly remarkable that there is the evidence there is of him. Nazareth really wasn't a big deal, and that is part of the point. Its not some kind of cop out, or playing both sides of the fence. I think you may have missed my point also. IF he were truly just some no name guy from Nazareth (I'm not saying he is, others would suggest that), that didn't really do all he did, then we wouldn't have the non Christian sources out there. We shouldn't have any really.
This is giving the benefit of the doubt for the moment all the Christian sources, of which there are many. Its not really fair that those get to be automatically tossed out as if they were all lying for a personal reason. Even so, it is very generous of the Christian crowd to suggest that people just search for themselves, into the sources that aren't Christian friendly. You just can't take the word of just anyone anymore, you and I have to search for ourselves, with the most intellectual integrity as one can muster, and taking of the often self applied lenses we are want to put on when we read other rebuttals, etc. Too many people just say anything. Thus, my initial encouragement. I think we can know what is more reasonable than what is not reasonable, even if you can't know something for 100% absolute fact.
I think it falls into the last category you give in that one quote, to be fair. It isn't really disputed among the historians (even non Christian ones) that he did mention Jesus at least. That it might have been embellished later is unfortunate, and kind of awful to do for the sake of real history. Still, that Jesus was included in the form of being mentioned is very much "something" for the sake of this discussion. Its great that we have honest Christians willing to be honest about the possible embellished parts.
I don't know about secular or anti-religious scholars, but most reliable evangelical scholars hold that the original had an authentic reference to Jesus but that it was embellished later. It's pretty doubtful that Josephus, a good Jew, would have said such glowing things about Jesus in just that one spot.
Not to mention the fact that if you read the passage before the Jesus reference and the one directly after, they flow together seamlessly, and the jesus reference is somewhat out of place.
additionally, early church fathers were examining the historical record for traces of Jesus, yet none of them mention Josephus until Origen.I created a thread called, "Be Prepared", which is quite relevant to your admittance.
No, what's actually illogical is to claim something is supernatural when it isn't possible for anyone to know that. In other words, we would have to know something about the supernatural in order to claim it, that's how things work. You can't claim something is based on a particular concept without knowing anything about that concept. It is the antithesis of logic.
I'm not claiming anything supernatural. I hold supernatural beliefs, but I'm not forcing those onto you or anyone else. I'm simply trying to show where the boundary lines are. You're the one that continually says there is no God, no proof of God, etc. You're the one making baseless claims. I'm just pointing out the logical fallacies of your statements. My whole point is that knowledge of science and the natural world in no way informs one way or the other. So belief in God does not directly equate to a lack of knowledge or understanding of science. One can be well informed and knowledgeable in science and simultaneously hold beliefs in God. They are not mutually exclusive.
They are for some. They shouldn't be but there are those that want to through a lot of science out because it doesn't line up with a 6000 year old universe and a global flood that lasted a year 4000 years ago. It's amazing what the mind is capable of doing to itself.
I know. I've seen first hand what the mind can do in trying to have conversations with some of these young earth believers. A big reason for this, I think, is this overall mindset that's becoming more and more prevalent that pits religion and science against one another as if accepting one means letting go of the other. It breeds ignorance on both sides of the aisle and only causes further division and animosity and ultimately holds us all back. I'm very much pro-science in my discussions with other believers and encourage them to embrace it. If we're ever going to move forward then it's important we all recognize the common ground we all share because the science is consistent, with the only real difference between us being a difference in philosophy.
You just contradicted yourself.
There is no proof of any gods, that is a fact of reality.
You're doing no such thing, you're only arguing in favor of your irrational beliefs. You have no proof whatsoever.
Then, how can you know of the supernatural?
Yet, that has been shown time and again here and elsewhere.
Yes, I know. That is the hypocrisy of believers. And, those folks are very few and in between.No contradiction. I hold beliefs but am not making a claim. You're making a claim by saying no God exists or that there's no evidence that God exists. That's a claim.
Because you have a very particular (and decidedly narrow) viewpoint you don't see that the very same evidence that supports your viewpoint supports mine as well. The order we see in the universe and the order we see in the self-organized genetic code of living organisms would be two pieces of evidence that support an intelligent creator.
I'm arguing against claims made by you and others by showing my viewpoint is just as relevant. The proof is the same for both viewpoints.
Yes, believers who just believe without critically analyzing their beliefs often are not versed in this kind of information, but that doesn't mean all believers lack understanding of science. There are plenty of physicists and biologists and scientists from every other field of study who make meaningful contributions to science while at the same time holding belief in God.
How is being well informed/knowledgeable in science and believing in God hypocrisy?No, that is a factual response to those who claim there is evidence, yet they never produce it. Do you actually not understand how claims work?
And yet, the evidence does not support your religious beliefs. Of course, you ignore that no matter how many times and how many people here keep telling you that.
You imagine order where none appears, that is your first flaw. You go on to imagine intelligence where none appears and conclude an intelligent creator where none appears.
Yet, you fail miserably in your explanations to show that.
But, you obviously lack understanding and only offer irrational and illogical beliefs.
So what? What they do in their fields of study have nothing to do with their irrational beliefs. And, it is not plenty, it is only a small minority.
One is logical and rational and based on hard evidence while the other is not.You're the one making claims. I don't know how else I can say it.
In what way does the evidence not support my religious beliefs?
How can you say there's no order? Einstein recognized there is order. Are you saying he imagined it too? How could we possibly calculate happenings in the universe via mathematic equations if there was no order?
You failing to understand or accept is not a failure on my part.
We've been through this before. You've yet to show just one example of something I "obviously lack understanding" in. And we've been doing this for a while, ATM. This is yet another claim of yours you've been unable to back up.
Yes, exactly, what they do in their fields has nothing to do with their beliefs. Yet you equate belief to a lack of understanding. That, ATM, is a contradiction. Minority, yes. Small minority, not exactly.
By your own admission there are scientists who make notable contributions to science who also believe in God. So how is it they can on one hand be logical and rational, yet not at the same time? Contradictions abound.I'm curious, headly. If I were to say there is no evidence for aliens, are you saying that I would have to present no evidence for aliens? Would you think I was responsible for the burden of proof to disprove aliens? What does evidence of an absence of evidence for aliens?
As far as order is concerned,
http://atheism.about.com/od/argumentsfo … ical_2.htmAliens, assuming they're from some other galaxy within this universe, you could very well discover evidence of their existence. Because they're a part of this universe. A product of it. Like us. You can't say no God exists with certainty based on what we know. And you can't even say there's no evidence of God's existence because existence itself could very well be the product of a God. We can't say either way.
As for the 'order' link, that's basically saying whatever order is observed in the universe, despite your definition of order, is not proof of God's existence. And I agree, it isn't. But any lack of order, again based on whatever definition of order you hold, is not proof of no God either. I was trying to illustrate how the very same information we know about the natural world that some refer to in regards to there being no God is the same information that supports the existence of an intelligent creator with deliberate intent. The data is the same. The interpretation of the data is different. No conclusive explanation has been reached either way.You know me, and you know that I would never make the claim that no gods exist. Perhaps I missed the initial comment or misconstrued it. If I say personally that I have not seen any credible evidence for God's existence, that's not making a claim. Saying that the things that have been presented as evidence are unconvincing or easily refuted is not exactly making a claim either. Even if there were credible evidence for A god, it would requirea great deal more objective evidence to demonstratea particular god over all other gods posited. If you say that existence itself is proof of God, it's a circular argument that cannot be demonstrated because you cannot objectively test non existence.
I respect the fact that you say no conclusive evidence has been discovered either way, although I'm STILL mad at you for the podcast (kidding, you did a good job). The human mind finds order, and functions by finding order and patterns in random things. That's how the mind works and processes information. It's why we see and recognize constellations and images in clouds. It's why we like puzzles and word searches. How do you determine what is actual order and differentiate between real order and seeming order that the mind produces. Furthermore, how do you go beyond that and determine the ultimate source of that order and give it a cause?I know, and I do still feel bad about not giving you your very much deserved 'shout-out'. If given the opportunity again I will not repeat that particular injustice!
Yes, you're right in that the human mind sees order. But it's not the order my mind, or anyone else's mind, sees that I'm referring to. It's the fact that the universe can be so accurately reflected in mathematical equations. The fundamental laws are fixed and by doing nothing more than introducing matter into the environment those laws create, the result is galaxies and suns and planets, including this inhabitable planet with its repeating weather and water cycles and seasons and the emergence of life. Organized, structured life. One of the biological definitions of a living organism is that it demonstrates organization. All living things do.
I simply suggest it's a valid argument that the universe we observe is the product of intelligent intent. We know for certain that intelligence exists. It is indeed a natural product of this environment. We still don't quite understand it, how exactly it came about, how exactly it works even, but we know it's real. And we see examples in nature of order that shares a lot of similarities with things created by this same intelligence. Genetic information being a primary example. Usually if we were to see differing, but repeating characters, arranged in a particular order that makes possible the retention and passing on of information, we'd see that as an intelligently created language. Yet that is very much what we see in our genetic code. A language made up of just four letters, yet able to pass along its specific sequence to further generations to build on top of. It's accumulated knowledge, so to speak.
While genetics had literally millions of years to fail, try again, whatever, those fundamental laws are fixed and there's just the one observable set in this one observable universe. So you don't have the benefit of multiple tries. You just have the one. And in that one we get all of this just by dropping some matter in the mix. Many of the world's physicists are turning to multiverse explanations to account for this 'just right' universe, positing not just a whole other universe, but millions. I'm simply saying what we observe could arguably be the product of an intelligence that intended the order we see. This isn't some wild imagining, but something we know for certain is a real thing and really is a product of this universe in some form or fashion. So I think it's a perfectly viable explanation to consider.
You can't say it because it isn't true.
We have, along with others here have gone through that point by point.
The evidence doesn't suggest order. Simple.
Sorry, Einstein said no such thing. Order and calculations are two different things.
Sure, tell that to that scientific community, too.
Yes, we've been down that road many times. How soon they forget.
Yes, contradictions abound. That's the thing about religious beliefs, people can be reasonable and rational about many things, until it comes down to their religious beliefs, then they toss it all out the window.
Indoctrination is a powerful tool.Which group? You don't me well enough by now that you ask me that?
All right...
*sigh*
BOTH groups. More to the point, there are a certain number of members in each group that simply accept that their way is best and don't really question anything. If they DO look into it, it's basically just to show how they were already right. In other words, irony fully intended, one of the core concepts they unquestioningly accept is that the OTHER side unquestioningly accepts 'the wrong side's' belief but they don't REALLY question just how right their own side is.
And I've certainly seen examples from both camps in these forums.It was critical thought that lead me to think that no God exists. One requires faith to believe God exists, because there is no evidence he does exist.
Here's the thing. You know I've always liked you and if we'd met I'm sure we'd get along fine without ever discussion the religious stuff. I never discuss with friends and when it does come up I change the discussion.
But it seems to me that you are unwilling to look at your own beliefs any way other than your own. As soon as someone brings an alternate way of looking at it you seem to become angry. This leads me to think you don't want to look at your beliefs critically.It's critical thought that keeps me believing, not the other way around.
Yeah, I'll freely admit that I did used to get angry, and yes I used to get angry at you, because the 'other ways' of looking at it almost invariably (not always, but almost) involve a subtle (and often not-at-all subtle) dehumanizing of believers. Now, I'm fully aware that many believers also do this to non-believers, and I try to avoid that. Nevertheless, no matter how much affection I may have for someone like you, or Mark, or ATW or JM (and I have respect and affection for all of you) there just is no way to make it feel good when you try to explain me to myself in a way that makes me a slave my superego, or unwilling to look at things "from a different perspective", or just stupid. I'm not saying that any of the people I've mentioned have done those things (except for you and the superego thing, which we've gone round about) but when it happens, it doesn't feel any more warm and fuzzy to me than it would to you guys if I went off on a 'slave to your sin' rant.
So in summary: what you characterize as me being unwilling to look at my beliefs any other way than my own ignores facts on the ground (a) that I wasn't a Christian until I was 22 and can still well remember how I used to look at things and (b) ignores that I do actually examine things from a different perspective often.
And what you characterize as "As soon as someone brings an alternate way of looking at it you seem to become angry." is actually a process of me getting more and more frustrated with people who I felt shouldn't continually dehumanize me and should understand when I don't like it. I'm over that now. But it didn't in any way happen all at once. It was a bit more out of control when Lisa had just died and the irrepressible Claire got my goat, but even then I didn't just instantly get pissed off, it took some time.What every you do, don't engage Claire. From time to time I attempt and it's never a fulfilling conversation. And I'm sorry if you feel that I am attempting to dehumanize you or anyone else. If anything I feel understanding ones own mind is a human thing to do. I would think telling someone that they have an eternal soul that will go one to heaven when the body dies is rather dehumanizing.
But I'm glad you are in a better place.Understanding one's own mind is both human and necessary. Not to belabor the point, but you assume that I don't really know my own mind and you have to explain it to me, as if I never think about or examine.
I've backed off on the Heaven and hell thing, BUT...
If you actually HAVE an eternal soul and it's going to wind up one place or the other, the real dehumanization would be for me to assume it doesn't matter what you believe or where you go. But having said that, it's not like I haven't discussed that here, so since it's largely the same group of people I think everyone pretty well knows where I stand on that.I suggest, Chris, that you will understand your mind better when you can look at and thoroughly realise what you desire. The desire(s) in most cases dictates the workings of the mind. Not talking of the brain here: that I would see as the "hardware." I see the mind as the "Random Access Memory," which feeds the ongoing Process of Thinking. What we see in the Printout is the real nature of our desires.
That "....one place or another" where you hope to "wind up," embodies your desires and can be sort of escapism.... accomplishing what you feel incapable of in this life.
To talk of eternity and place - these are opposites: eternity is infinite, place is finite. Dealing with the latter, the here-and-now, would be more fruitful, I suggest.With all due respect John (and yes, I do have respect for you) you are falling into the same pattern that I have complained about (to apparently no avail) before. I was pretty happy not worrying about Heaven or hell. I was on no spiritual quest. I didn't start thinking about these things until I was touched by something very very other.
What in the world makes you think I don't deal the here and now?
You're free to point them out at any time. Of course, honesty would be a requirement in that regard.
Everyone who's rejecting this very simple point I've been trying to make for a full page now is accepting beliefs uncritically. Without any proof or even a rough concept of how it's even possible, you have no problem assigning consciousness, intelligence, reason, intuition, imagination, self-awareness, love, passion, anger, to a lump of matter. Convinced that's all it is. All we are. And anyone else who even suggests there's maybe more to it, well that's just nonsense. Right? That's a belief. In this case it's the belief that we already understand the nature of the mind well enough to be able to say what is and isn't true, and we're now just waiting for the details to be filled in.
Have you ever known any of the elements on the periodic table, or any combination of elements, to exhibit these kinds of behaviors anywhere outside of the brain? Yet, you have no problem assigning this behavior to matter and matter alone.I think you are on to something here, how people accept beliefs uncritically, but depending on the belief. Some even define what is a belief and what isn't. Its clear to see what is fact, belief, opinion. All you said makes sense there, and clearly there has to a view out there that makes sense of the strange behavior (for lack of a better word) observed where consistencies don't matter, nor logic or reason. Its easy to not embrace those things if things get a bit uncomfortable. I think its the very fact that you are likely right, and that you get the response you get. The biggest clue though is that if there was a good rebuttal, that surely would be given instead of the poor reasoning, or sometimes the ongoing, "nuh uh, is too, I know you are but what am I," kinds of responses I am always amazed to see. Sometimes we some couched in terminology that couches itself in reminding us of their tremendous "knowledge and education" in this and that, and experiences like, "back when I was young and a lot more stupid, I used to believe that kind of stuff....."
Bottom line, a claim is a claim, and a rebuttal is a rebuttal, and an argument is an argument and they all look like something i particular. An assertion isn't an argument, nor is a denial, nor is a put down, nor is twisting what someone said or putting words in their mouth. Which all take a LONG time to have to go back and correct and prove and show, and people either spend too much time on this stuff, or get so frustrated they say something and get banned or close to it. Its a mess so often, hate to say it, and there's certainly no denying it.
The group that does that, almost continually. (Meaning a group of people does this, on the web and on Hubpages.) Part of the means to get it done (when normally they would be against such a thing) is to deny it is being done by them, and only by the opposing side.
The truth is in the arguments, or points, or lack of. If any of us do this, it doesn't serve us well to deny it when we do it, or just say others are doing it when we are doing it. This takes a great deal of intellectual integrity and honesty. The fact that is can show one's own held beliefs to be lacking, is hard to accept and take but its a better thing to face than the alternative. Living a life of continual self deception, to what end? Life is flying by, and precious and short. Why do we do this to ourselves?
May I encourage us all to really consider our words before we even speak, so that we don't have to take a lot of time defending poorly held ideas, and also to consider that another persons good rebuttal may be a good rebuttal. Even if we aren't comfortable with good answers for whatever reason, doesn't mean they aren't good answers, or thoughts to ponder. I say this to myself first.When asked what would change his mind Nye responded "evidence", Ham responded "nothing".
Hmmm, not sure what that has to do with what I said though.
That would show no understanding of atheism, or logic, or reason, or indoctrination.
Note to Rad: Here's the guy who cheerfully and invariably meets the criteria I used to complain about. Yet he complains when I say he makes my points for me. Unless ED is a she, in which case, SHE complains when I say she makes my points for me...
At what point do you stop looking for real explanations and decide it's supernatural? Imagine if our greatest minds did that with gravity? Wait we don't have to imagine it, that what Newton did and Einstein didn't do.
If only you were as clever as you think you are...
More personal attacks? I guess you're done here, then.
Actually you've been done for some time, you just failed to realize it.
Then what do you say to the guy who says his supernatural experience told him that God doesn't contain Jesus or the holy spirit?
At this point what I do is explore his experience. That's what I would do in any case. Lots of people who have claimed supernatural experiences that don't involve Jesus, the Holy Spirit, or even the Judeo-Christian God. Before I became a Christian, I used to hang out with Wiccans, though not to the extent that I ever became one.
Chris, we've gone over this briefly a few times, but I thought I'd jump in here as well.
Yes, thousands upon thousands of people worldwide have all claimed to have personal experiences with god. Some have visions. Some hear voices. Some claim answered prayer. These claims are all important, and they should be respected - but they're still all subjective. No one can demonstrate the reality of them, and all are interpreted differently by the various people that claim them - and all attribute a different god to them. Some are attributed to the Christian god. Some to the Muslim god. Some to innumerable other gods across history and even in the present. These subjective experiences may prove something to the person who has them - or at least confirm what they already believe, but they cannot be tested or examined. Often, they can not even be DISCUSSED because a lot of people take those attempts personally and lash out at those that are talking to them. (I'm really not talking about you here, but about several others).
We're still left with nothing but subjective evidence that cannot be proven or demonstrated or tested with innumerable different sources and accreditation for them, and I hate to say it, but I agree. Bringing out these thousands/millions of examples seems like an appeal to popularity.I respect that you're honest about it. My one caveat is the line
For every person like you who talks to me in a calm and reasonable manner, there are three getitrites or ATM's who's first and only response is that I'm dishonest or crazy. Since I'm the only Christian on one whole entire side of my family, I can actually relate to Thousand Words in that I've had conversations with family members who are not just in disagreement but in judgement of me.I understand your point, Chris. I think the important thing for both of us to remember is that we cannot lump the other person in with the other people who treat them poorly. For me, I cannot compare you with the abusive and berating Christians that I have encountered my entire life who want to condemn me for being who I am - and you cannot lump me in with all of the more "in your face" atheists out there that you've encountered.
I want to be able to discuss these things with you openly and honestly, but in order to do that, I think we both need to leave our own baggage behind. If I ask you questions, you have to understand that it's in my attempt to understand you better, and not to just dismiss you as delusional or insane. Likewise, I have to accept your experiences as your experiences, and respect your belief in them and the implications of those beliefs - even though I may not agree with them personally. I think that's the key to a mutually understanding and communication when it comes right down to it.
You and I have both encountered our fair share of people on these forums that are best left avoided on both sides of these issues. That doesn't mean that two people from opposite sides can't gain from continuing the conversation and keeping it civil whenever possible. Letting go of that baggage isn't always simple, as evidenced by some of our past attempts. I think, though, as we both keep growing individually, that we will find a way to overcome those hurdles positively.I completely agree and I appreciate what you're saying.
Reality by consensus? You got to be kidding.
A) You said it, not me. And I didn't say it.
B) How can I be kidding when I didn't say it?"Thousand, hundreds of thousands, MILLIONS of people have some kind of God experience."
yes you did.Are YOU kidding?
No, I didn't. You may be unwilling or unable to see it some other way than the one you want, but that doesn't mean I said it.
Another illustration of the trickiness of memories/subjective looks at situation is what so often happens to people with relationships. Especially with women.
When I was younger I used to develop a crush on most of the guys I became friends with. My experiences with them when I would retell them to others sounded so lovely and like we were soul-mates or something. But their recounts of our experience together were never the same as mine. They were physical experiences that we both shared, but how I remembered it was different because of how I felt vs how they felt. Was I recounting what happened as it happened or as my feelings and preconceived notions told me it was happening? Was what I experienced therefore "real?"Your mental experience was the cause behind your behavior. How you saw things and remembered things had a very real impact on your life. In everything we observe through science it's key to understand the behavior that causes a result. Yet the causes behind most of what we humans do cannot be objectively confirmed, yet have no less of an impact.
But that's two different things. The impact that the experience had on me impacted my life in a real way, yes. But the experience itself didn't even happen the way I imagined it. I've simply learned to stop doing that because I know that how I experience something especially in an emotional stupor isn't necessarily how it happened. The effects are real. The cause of those effects did not really happen in my mind the way it happened in reality. Therefore it was not "real." Again, this comes down to how we're defining "real."
You haven't mentioned schizophrenia or hallucinations. Are those "real" experiences even though they're real to the individual?
edit: nevermind about the schizo and hallucination thing I just read your post;Yes, exactly. It wasn't even necessarily the actual events that impacted you and your actions, but how you remembered them. In fact, it was the way in which you were remembering them that determined your behavior. Your mental state had such a real impact on your life that you had to take charge and change the way you thought to change the resulting behavior. So how can we say something isn't real just because it's intangible and unobservable to others when it has such a real impact on what you do?
Though you have given me some things to think over, I still think we're using the word "real" differently. And we also may be talking about different aspects of the experience.
I think something that may be overlooked, is the point about an album or music being in someone's head, and later being observable by others once it is out of the mind and able to be observed by others with their senses. I think the key here is when the music came into existence. Without what goes on in the mind, there would never be this music. The album, from cover to the sounds from the instruments and the composition, are all RELIANT on the music first in the mind. Without which the other would never come to fruition or come to be. He could hear it in his mind, and has been able to for years according to him. It is real. To suggest they were not real until later when others can approve of their existence doesn't seem logical. You can apply all the physical tools you want, but no music is coming without the original composers creation of it, the thing that took place in a mind.
A case can be made that the album can never even "be" without what takes place in the mind. It is the key to the whole thing. Yet you can't open up said mind and "find the music." Now we have an example of something immaterial that is very much real. The idea that it only becomes real once others can see it or hear it is one that doesn't follow through in this case.Says who? We've already started the technology that can map brain activity to recreate images in a persons mind. Who's to say we won't be able to do it with music?
It is still only "real" subjectively to the single individual before it becomes real objectively to the collective. What if you tell me you have a song to compose in your head? If I don't have the technology to find it, and you never compose the song, why should I believe that you have the song in your head? Simply because you say so? Show me the song. Sing it for me. Write down the musical notes. If it is happening in your head, you should be able to compose it. Then I'll have no problem believing you. And it will be testable and anyone will be able to play your same song using the notes you've written down.I wasn't making a case against people being able to someday possibly recreate images in a persons mind. This doesn't undo what I said.
I am talking of the existence of music in and of itself. I showed how it can be immaterial in a person's mind, but very much real and how its absolutely necessary to be able to put it to paper and instruments. You can't even have one without the others existence already in place.(Usually, and in the example given.)
My point in short, was there is nothing magical about getting it to the paper, putting notes on paper or to an instrument that suddenly makes it be the music that it is, that was heard in the persons mind first, created there. I don't agree about the point where it was suggested is only real subjectively, and what makes it turn objectively real.
This is where this conversation is hinging I believe, on that idea being true or not. Which is why I spoke mostly on that topic. I am not speaking of necessarily convincing you OF the song, as much as I am showing how something can actually "be", without it being material, or observable with the five senses. In this case the immaterial is absolutely necessary before it can get traction so you can observe it or experience it yourself. It isn't needing "permission" to exist first. Its not about a problem of you believing a person or not, but if it became about that and you needed the proof, the other things I stated still stand in regards to when it came into existence, the immaterial thing that it was first. The person and the song created, have no doubt about this, and you can experience the same thing, as I. So now we are talking about two different things, and am happy to talk about both.
The album does exist in your brain as a pattern. Not out here in reality yet until you make it. As for dreams, everyone has them so we all agree they happen. They have very objective reasons for happening. They are also patterns in the brain. But they are not real out here outside your head. They are like imagination. It does exist and brain function can be seen to happen these days. These are all physical processes that have a basis in the physical world.
Correction, we assume these are all physical processes and we associate them to observed patterns because we assume we understand the nature of the mind and are just waiting for the details to be filled in. Doesn't make it true. In fact what it ultimately does is it puts us on a very particular path that may or may not actually be correct. It causes us to reject other possibilities because we're so certain we already know, without actually knowing.
Without the ability to see them, or measure them, they can still have a very real impact on our actions and behaviors. So in that way, though they don't exist outside of our heads, they are still real because they cause real effects."Correction, we assume these are all physical processes and we associate them to observed patterns because we assume we understand the nature of the mind and are just waiting for the details to be filled in. Doesn't make it true. "
And we can assume this because if you cut away parts of the brain people lose function and memory. No memory at all makes you a vegetable.
If there was a soul we would not expect that to happen and the brain would be a big snot box like the Egyptians thought. But it isn't. So the details are what we are missing, not the evidence. .That's interesting. Why do you say we wouldn't expect these things to happen if there were a soul? It seems to me perfectly logical that information gathered through the senses- sights, sounds, smells, memories, etc.. physical information, would be stored and accessed in a physical brain. It would be the perfect mechanism for a soul to interact with the physical world through. All throughout life experience we gather information that we use to associate with reality that enables us to function. So if the neural networks set throughout that process are damaged or severed, it's understandable it would severely impact our capability to function.
But that doesn't mean there isn't a soul. A soul is non-physical. Spiritual. The brain is a mechanism. It's a mechanism we use to store and recall past experiences and conceptualize a desired outcome and imagine potential results of various actions. But there are some rather large components at play that we still don't understand all that well. There's consciousness and there's life itself.
Consciousness sprang from life. Though there's no structural molecular difference between a living organism and a dead organism, when an organism is alive it actively pursues what it needs to continue living. Biologically, something is defined as alive if it exhibits homeostasis, metabolism, growth, adaptation, organization, etc. It's a working system that actively pursues and attains sustenance and turns it into energy to stabilize its internal system/temperature, to grow, procreate. When it's dead it doesn't. Same components. Same elements. No activity.
In a material view, life tends to be reduced to biological cause and effect machines. We ourselves experience life. We experience the will that drives us, the wants, the needs and desires. We're compelled to do all the same things as every other living thing; eat, sleep, procreate. We experience the same emotions as other mammals, we love and nurture and we get angry and sad. We know all of this. We see things happen in the brain in correspondence to these urges and feelings. Chemicals, pulsing neurons. So we just point at the flashing light that comes on every time so and so does this or that and we tie them together. That must be what causes that.
But we don't really get it. We don't really get what life really is, what consciousness really is. We seem to be in conscious control of what we do. But how does consciousness fit into anything we understand about material matter? About elements? What elements or chemicals mix together and create consciousness? Yes, we can see all of these components at work. This receptor admitting one chemical and rejecting another. We see oxygenated blood being routed to the various lobes in use during a particular thought process. So is this a machine responding to a driver/operator? Or is this a machine that's simply running itself?Again, to be brief here, where is your consciousness in dreamless sleep? Or under anesthetic? The bar keeps getting moved when we are talking about souls. Some say it gives us consciousness and some like you say it gives us life if that is what you are saying. So does an ant have a soul? Is it not alive? Most people say animals do not have souls, yet they are alive. We are animals. So does all biology have a soul and go to heaven?
Spirit? What is that? It's another one of those invisible pink squirrels no one can prove the existence of.
And you were the one that said we were guessing as to what the brain does, but when I mention that if it becomes impaired you are no longer you and lose functionality and memory. Why would a soul not have memory?
As to consciousness that's easy enough. I just finished a hub on "the origins of consciousness " if you are interested in my answer to that.
But you guys are all over the place on this soul and spirit thing and there is zero evidence of either being more than imagination..Well I can't speak for anyone else, but I feel I've been pretty consistent with this whole soul and spirit thing. The distinction was made long before this modern age of material science between the physical and the spiritual. The body and the soul. This isn't some new tactic dreamt up to combat the latest discoveries of the workings of the brain.
Gen9:5 - And for your lifeblood I will surely demand an accounting. I will demand an accounting from every animal. And from each human being, too, I will demand an accounting for the life of another human being.
Yes, I believe all living things have a soul that compels it to live and be fruitful and multiply and the rest. In fact, the most direct translation of Genesis 1 when speaking of life coming from the sea, it describes them as moving creatures that are "soul living". And again, when speaking of beasts coming from the earth it says the same, "nphsh chie", soul living. And when they die, I think they return to 'the source', so to speak. But not being 'of Eve' and thus having free will, are unable to be disconnected from nature/God and therefore not subject to judgement as we are. But yes, basically, I think the level of capability one has to project one's soul into the material world is limited by the physical form we interact with the world through. So yes, a damaged or chemically altered brain would seriously hinder your ability to emote.
What I don't get is we keep probing deeper into the brain, and I guess because we found it to be something other than a "snot box" as you put it, or a little man puppeting our bodies, or a soul gland I guess, people reach the conclusion that there is no soul. And then say people like me who believe there is a soul keep changing our tunes. I'm not sure what you expect to see if there had been material/physical evidence.
No I don't have material evidence. I have intuition. Intuition that says being alive is something more than purely mechanical. That all the things we think and feel and desire are more than just unintended bi-products of an evolving brain. With no soul, no non-physical component of the self, all we're left with is cold mechanical deterministic biology. Which means everything you and I have ever done, including this very conversation, as well as anything else anyone has done, good or bad, throughout all of history, was determined the moment the big bang banged. It means this life is ultimately a meaningless burp in a 13.7 billion year old ripple that will ultimately play out, and nothing we've ever done or will ever do will ever really matter. It means everything we cherish most about being human, the choices we make and the purpose we assign to life, is one grand illusion to keep our brains in a state that promotes optimum functionality. When in reality we are nothing more than passive observers.And, there you have it, nothing. No evidence, only a belief. So much for your arguments.
I have the same amount of material evidence to prove God exists and souls exist as you have to prove your mind exists. None. So, by your material standards, none of these do. I'm pretty sure you actually do have a mind, despite the lack of evidence. So, because there's at least one thing we know exists that doesn't according to what you deem acceptable, then it's pretty easy to recognize that your viewpoint is too limited to account for everything. So, you might want to reassess. There are some glaring holes in your logic.
These conversations are evidence of our minds. I'm not sure why you insist there is no evidence for our minds. It's strange.
These conversations are as much evidence of our minds as the universe is evidence of God.
Again, the word "mind" is simply a term to describe a select few of the functions of the brain. The brain is very real. The mind is only a part of the function of the brain. When those areas of the brain are damaged, it's quite noticeable how the "mind" is also effected.
True, functions of the mind are enabled by the physical brain and are hampered by damage to the brain. But the fact still remains that the mind is an unobservable immaterial phenomenon that without a doubt exists, yet cannot be shown to exist. We can only associate happenings in the mind with physical functions in the brain, but because we cannot observe and objectively confirm mental functions, there is always that subjective layer. Whether that be the subject's explanation of what was happening in their mind, or whether that be the tester associating his/her own mental experiences with physical activity in the subject's brain. This is why psychology is not a natural science, but a behavioral science.
This is what you're offering here:
http://www.nizkor.org/features/fallacie … rring.htmlInteresting, you're actually dodging addressing my statements by giving me a link to an explanation for what a 'red herring' is? You're using 'red herrings' as a red herring? Very cunning, ATM. Very cunning. I guess shifting blame to me is easier than admitting you can't address my points.
I could point out other fallacies you consistently and often use. But, what's the point, your posts reek with them.
Does a Red Herring have a real colour, and is it really a fish? !! Now there's a distraction for you,
Does a Figure of Speech have form, or is it purely abstract and metaphorical?
After so many postings in such a short space of time, I am wondering if anyone has changed his/her opinion as a result of reading someone else's point of view in this Forum. Has it all been worthwhile, beyond the fun of argument?I have changed my mind about something due to someone on the forum.
I said that that humans couldn't have built the Pyramids with the tools available to them at the time. Wilderness then showed me a video of a man lifting several ton blocks on his own with only rocks and a few pieces of wood. I was forced to admit that humans might in fact be able to build the Pyramids in such a manner.You are exactly right, Jonny. Most everyone here, with the exception of you and A Thousand Words, is not open to anything other than what they already thought. This is not a discussion, it's a series of corrections. And it feels like one colossal waste of time. It leaves me feeling like there's no hope for humanity because we're all too stubborn to change the way we think. If we're all convinced we're right, then we're all most assuredly wrong. I feel like the point I'm making is a really simple one, yet it's being rejected as if simply agreeing to this one point means you have to accept God's existence. Like every point is an all or nothing scenario.
When people in power, like politicians, priests and CEOs adopt stubbornness, that can be dangerous. They are the ones we like to blame for all our problems. I feel we can all exist, side-by-side, if there is agreement to differ.
I agree. One major component in this particular schism is the fact that real common ground actually exists between these two viewpoints that would actually allow for much more cohesion than we currently have. Yet there are so many on both sides of the fence who so staunchly reject alternative viewpoints that common ground can never even be acknowledged, even though it's sitting right there in front of all of us.
I could have and should have listed you as an exception as well. I knew as soon as I started specifying individuals that was undoubtedly going to get me in trouble by leaving someone out. I should add Slarty to that list as well, given some of his more recent posts I've read. Rad Man as well, though he tends to latch onto particular things like a pit bull and that makes it difficult to progress an idea.
Really the only one that response was most referring to is A Troubled Man, AKA EncephaloiDead.It's funny how you really want me to be that other guy. I suppose it means a great deal to you?
Can I start obsessing about you, too?Well that's just because I'm right and your wrong. When I'm wrong I change the subject very quickly.
Haha... well, it takes two dogs to turn it into a tug-of-war, so it's not like you're alone in this particular dance. I can be pretty stubborn too. But what can I say, if you were right I'd agree with you.
Yikes....
Did you mean on one side in particular? I am sure I misunderstood.
As for the rest, I kind of understand, and worry about the complete and utter waste of time this all could be. Some are much more patient than others, but it is a bit scary if this is a fair cross section of humanity, but I think it can't be. There is a unique element on the web, that talk very big that in real life scenarios wouldn't get away with the manner in which they operate on here. Still, its good to put a stone in someone's shoe and get one put into your own on occasion. Hubpages affords a perfect environment for some of these kinds of people, but its that very thing that sometimes drives me away. In the end, life is short and I think truth will last, whatever it is, and so ideas being shared is good for all over all.Yeah, not my proudest moment. I find that when I spend days on end in these forums I tend to get a bit punchy. I find it helps to step away from time to time, and that time for me may be nearing again. Discussions like yours and mine are what keep me coming back, though I do have to say this particular round of forum discussions with multiple individuals has actually yielded some better than usual conversations. But I still managed to get my fill of the 'uh-huh/huh-uh' back and forths about the mind. It should be a simple point to make, the sky is blue, water is wet, and the mind is non-physical. But, it seems some pretty serious misconceptions about neuroscience has apparently lulled quite a few into thinking we can actually 'observe' the mind. But, as we know, faith and belief leading one to false conclusions is not just the sole domain of religion. It's a human thing. It's that darn unobservable, purely subjective mind. It can be tricky.
Excuse me, I'll have you know that you are 1000x wrong, sir. My mind has changed on a number of things based on the conversations I've had in these forums. I've been on Hubpages for over two years, and the conversations that I've had with people religious or not has helped me to form some of what my worldview is now, along with knowledge and an expanse in my thinking about certain things. But you are the pot calling the kettle black, it seems. Because you seemed to be convinced of things that just aren't testable, but if we tell you that, it's because we're the ones that aren't open-minded.
How is it that you think you know what I am or am not open to? I'm not gullible, for certain. But I am also quite aware of much more than you realize and I know that there are things we've only scratched the surface of. Knowledge continuously expands the mind. I'm aware that there are things that we can't explain, yet, if we ever will be able to. And there are things we can only explain to an extent. But excuse me and others for not jumping to the same conclusions as you.
In your responses to other people, you keep saying that you're not always just speaking of us accepting that there is a God, but the just possibility that there are things that are real that we can't measure or that are immaterial. It seems you're expecting us to just feign on your words as if they're some high level of insight? You make assumptions that once we didn't think this way. You make assumptions while telling us how open-minded we aren't.
We live in a material Universe as far as we can know and understand. There are things that we can test. There are things that we can have some understanding of, because if there weren't, then we'd never be able to do anything with the information that we have. There are medicines that have very specific purposes because over time we have learned which parts of the brain do what. Do we have a full understanding of the brain? No way. Are we constantly learning more about it? Of course. Do we find unquestionable reasons to consider that the mind is some kind of special and higher functioning? If we don't grasp onto human ego, no. If we don't by into the fact that humans are anything special, then no. What do we see? We see that when the pre-frontal cortex is damaged, depending on which part, we can observe the effects. Meaning we can observe a difference in one's ability to perceive right from wrong. Or we can observe a change in ability to make decisions. Or, if the areas of the brain affecting memory are damaged, what do we find? That their short term memory or their long term memory is lost/limited. So what, should we throw everything out that we've learned through observation because there could be more that we're missing? No. Do we think we should just assume that the mind is higher because we feel like it is? Because according to the understanding of some, there's no way the mind can function how it does as a function of the brain while only being matter and energy? How do you know that it's not? Or more importantly how can you know that it's not? We can speculate, sure. But it is because we can make observations like we do that we don't feel the need to, yet. We will keeping learning. We will keep searching. The people that need to grasp will hold onto stuff religiously, but the people solely interesting in knowledge and understanding will have knowledge and understanding that evolves with the information. We don't know that one day material knowledge won't lead us to some kind of reality we weren't aware of.
Until there is a time when some higher entity decides to shed light for everyone whether they like to use the scientific method and see material facts or are "open-minded" to umpth degree and have belief in the metaphysical alike, there are those of us that are not going to take your word for it because there are things that we can understand materially at the moment, and we couldn't care less if that makes you lose hope in humanity, because I care about humanity, and how far my eyes have been opened because of my quest for knowledge has allowed me to have more empathy than religion and spiritual belief ever did.
Really, Headly? It's just us? Get over yourself. Or are you expecting us all to say "Eureka, Headly, you're right! What a genius, this man!" How willing are you to accept that it isn't explainable by something merely speculative? Or are we the only ones that need to be "corrected" to you? All these forums are is discussion. Because discussion doesn't equal us having to believe you or you having to believe us. It means we talk. And we disagree or we agree. And sometimes someone might say something that resonates with us and sheds light on a view point. And often that doesn't happen (to our knowledge). But we still have the conversation. But don't tell me about me, please and thank you, as I know I'm not the same person I was when I joined Hubpages.I haven't read all of this yet, though I still intend to, but I have already since detracted from this comment as it was just me being frustrated. But if you read what I said you'll notice I named you specifically as an exception to what I was griping about. I thought you and I had a pretty good discussion and you showed yourself to be very open minded. I'm sorry if I wasn't clear, but I wanted to make sure you understand I was not talking about you in this post....
"Most everyone here, with the exception of you and A Thousand Words, is *not* open to anything other than what they already thought.[//i]
And here's my less frustrated response after the fact ....
[i]"Yeah, not my proudest moment. I find that when I spend days on end in these forums I tend to get a bit punchy. I find it helps to step away from time to time, and that time for me may be nearing again. Discussions like yours and mine are what keep me coming back, though I do have to say this particular round of forum discussions with multiple individuals has actually yielded some better than usual conversations. But I still managed to get my fill of the 'uh-huh/huh-uh' back and forths about the mind. It should be a simple point to make, the sky is blue, water is wet, and the mind is non-physical. But, it seems some pretty serious misconceptions about neuroscience has apparently lulled quite a few into thinking we can actually 'observe' the mind. But, as we know, faith and belief leading one to false conclusions is not just the sole domain of religion. It's a human thing. It's that darn unobservable, purely subjective mind. It can be tricky.Hm. Well there's definitely some twinge of annoyance in there mixed in with some possibly good points. And I'm sorry, because I got a little punchy myself. I did read it wrong, though, so that was my bad. Essentially these discussions aren't going to go very far as far as significantly changing any minds on any consistent basis. We're here because we think something and have something to say about it. The people participating in that aren't going to have their opinions so easily changed. Though it isn't impossible.
I was definitely annoyed. I generally have the mindset that I'm not going to change any minds. I primarily have these discussions to test my own viewpoint through people who see things differently than I arguing against it. And I also try to contribute what I feel is a level-headed pro-science Christian perspective to the overall conversation. I don't expect anyone to just jump on board with anything I'm saying. I expect and want criticism and critical analysis. But it does help matters if we can just agree on the most fundamental of points, which is what was bugging me yesterday, and not get hung up on something completely silly like...
- "The sky is blue."
- "Well, technically, it isn't"
- "Water is wet."
- "Well, technically, that's not true"
- "The mind isn't observable."
- "Well, technically, we can see brain activity so we can see the mind"
I do have a couple of thoughts I'd like to share about your post regarding a couple of things you said, but I'm currently trying to put together a rather lengthy response to oceansnsunsets. I do have to say you were really giving me the business in that post. Remind me to avoid getting on your bad side!
The mind is testable and can be seen working using MRI's. God is not testable and cannot be seen.
The mind is really a reification of the actions of the brain. So you can rationally say it does not exist (as an object) any more or less than the smile or the lap.
MRI's allow us to observe a functioning brain, but we do not see the mind. Think about it this way, the mental experience we all know is a behavior of the physical matter/energy of our brain that we cannot observe. There are physical happenings that we can associate to those functions of the mind, but we cannot see the mind. Science is all about observing behavior. Yet here is a behavior we know for a fact exists because we each experience it, yet cannot be seen in any material sense. So if there's even one behavior of matter/energy we can't see, who's to say that's all there is? What are the odds that's all there is? That the only matter/energy anywhere in the universe with more going on behaviorally than what can be observed is just our brains and nothing else?
From the materialist standpoint, only what can be observed is admissible. Yet there is at least one thing we know of for sure exists that doesn't fit into the materialism box. So then how can a materialism viewpoint ever hope to explain the entirety of existence if there's even one thing that exists that falls outside of its jurisdiction? And that one thing is no small thing. It's consciousness, intelligence, reason, imagination, intuition. Somehow the matter in our heads has become conscious and self-aware and able to imagine things that don't exist, yet we have no idea how. We just know that specific parts of the brain 'light up' in accordance to specific happenings in the mind.But we do see the mind. When people are asked to think about certain things, like do math or meditate specific brian sections light up during an MRI. Therefor the mind is observable and testable. We know drugs effect the mind, as does trauma. We use IQ and other test to test the function of the mind. The mind is a function of our brains and this function can be tested.
Therefore the mind is nothing like the God you describe that has been tested, but doesn't show up.So you can see the mind doing math? No. You can see physical brain activity in the same region of the brain as the last time they did math, but you don't see the mind. The point is, the mind isn't material. This is something that is part of reality that doesn't fit the material mold. Don't jump all the way to God and comparing the mind to God or any of that. Let's not get ahead. Let's simply acknowledge this one simple thing. The mind is a behavior of the matter/energy of the brain that cannot be observed. You can maybe determine someone is doing math based on observed brain activity, but you cannot see the equation they're working out or the method employed to do that equation. You just see brain activity.
Right, you see activity and can measure that activity. It's predictable and measurable and is the product of brain matter. Much like the product of a dump truck is to move dirt. We can measure how much dirt is moved.
You can pretty much say that about anything. Everything. You can measure and calculate, but ANYTHING you measure, you still can't define what, exactly, it is.
You can pick things apart, down to quarks, define things by the measurements you make, but we are all still in the dark about what anything actually is.You are right, except that that can't be done for God. Headly is attempting to say that the mind is not measurable and therefore like God. But the mind is measurable, it can be predicted and tested.
You did it again. You jumped right to God. You're putting words in my mouth. I'm simply pointing out an example of something that undoubtedly exists that doesn't fit the material mold. The very mold you use to rule out anything and everything that cannot be objectively proven to be true. I am pointing out something that is a major component of reality as we experience it that doesn't fit that viewpoint. To make it fit you keep trying to reduce all the mental experience is to brain activity, as if that sums it all up. Clearly it doesn't.
I'm bringing it up because you are bringing it up when you say want to find something that exists and doesn't fit the material hold. Of course the mental experience is a product of the brain. The brain dead has not mind or thought, this can be tested for. Is this another God done it moment? We don't fully understand it so God done it? Say it's not so.
You're the one that keeps saying 'God'. I didn't bring that up. I didn't even say the mind isn't a product of the brain. I agree that it is. I'm simply saying it can't be observed. If each of us didn't experience the mind ourselves, there's nothing about a functioning brain that would in any way indicate to us what's really going on in there.
It seems to me (and if I'm wrong I'm sorry) but you brought up the mind to show that there are things that exist that you think can't be measured or seen like God. I'm just pointing out that the mind is nothing like what most think of God. So you can't say God could exist because things like it also exist, because the mind is measurable and detectable.
This whole discussion has to do with materialism. The mind is the primary reason why I'm not a materialist. Even if I didn't believe in God, I still wouldn't be a materialist. It's a viewpoint that injects certainty into things we don't understand well enough to be so certain about. It closes doors of possibility and constricts free inquiry. This conversation is all about that. About why the materialism viewpoint is illogical to me. The very same thing many atheists say about belief in God, that it constricts scientific advancement, a materialist viewpoint does the very same thing. The mind is a primary example of something that does not exist in any material, observable way, yet is undoubtedly part of our reality, and actually has an impact on our reality. So a purely materialist viewpoint is inadequate in formulating an explanation for all that reality is. We're a long way from 'God done it' at this point in the discussion. Though I have logical reasoning that leads me all the way to that point, and even to a particular God, that's a long way from here.
I've shown you repeatedly that it does exist in an observable measurable physical way. Is it all completely understood, no but that doesn't mean it will never be understood. I find it confusing that you seem to understand that MRI's can determine problems with the mind and what the mind is doing and then say that the mind doesn't exist in any observable way.
Physical brain activity does not equal the mind. Imagine for a second that we were robots or aliens who are studying humans and trying to figure them out. We can observe their activities, we can even scan them and see all of this activity in their brains. We see these neural connections pulsing electricity, we see blood flow being re-routed to the various lobes of the cortex. We can see activity in the brain in relation to when their arms and legs move. Yet sometimes they're just sitting there, still, yet there's all this activity. They're not doing anything, saying anything, yet the mind is clearly very busy.
Now, is there anything about that brain activity that in any way gives these aliens/robots an idea of just how dynamic the mental experience really is? Do they have any concept of imagination by looking at brain activity? Everything we know, or even think we know, about the mind through our studies of the brain is based on our own associations to our own mental experience. If we didn't have it, there'd be no way of knowing, just by looking at a working brain, that the mental experience even exists.Consciousness is one of the things the brain does. It can be measured and observed. We know for instance what part of the brain will be active when doing math and we know what happens when the brain is split in two. We know that the right hemisphere can no long access the language area, but can still think.
That's observing and IQ test measure the minds ability.
Ask them to do certain tasks and compare the brain activity. If one really wanted to experiment they could damage certain areas and OBSERVE the results. They could map the brain kinda like we have done.
No, it has to do with evidence. If you wish to use terms like "materialism" because you can't show any evidence, then you're done here.
Predictable? MRI's constantly show areas of the brain lighting up that weren't expected. Measurable, yes. Predictable?
Enough measurements/observations and it will eventually become completely predictable. Studying brain activity and stimuli through MRI is still in it's infanthood. Lots of different stimuli and lots of different areas of the brain equal lots of different combinations.
This is true and I agree. But as you pointed out, we're not at the point where we can confidently predict brain activity yet.
They learned that cussing actually comes from a different area of the brain than language (that may be a bit oversimplified, but it's the gist.) People with brain injuries who have trouble with speech sometimes still can curse fluently.
The brain is weird.I remember reading something about how anger is useful as a pain reliever. That the reason we yell "F%$^" if we stub our toe or something. Maybe that's why some people are so angry all the time, their addicted to their own pain relieving chemicals...
Sorry, off topic, don't mind me:)What I was referring to was the MRI patterns that emerge what patients are asked to perform certain tasks. Math or meditate for example. A lot have been learn about the patterns we see when monks meditate or pray and why for instance some get that floating feeling. So the technician can predict what patterns will emerge when they ask a patient to perform a task or judge what the patient is doing from watching the MRI's
That's nice. So what?
The evidence is the brain and how the synaptic neurons work.
"A mind is the set of cognitive faculties that enables consciousness, perception, thinking, judgement, and memory—a characteristic of humans, but which also may apply to other life forms."
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mind"...which also may apply to other life forms"
And why does that say 'may apply to other life forms'? Would it be because there's no way to confirm? Other life forms also have firing neurons and other activities much like we have in our brains, yet we can't determine whether or not they have a mental experience as we do. We just assume they do. That should tell you something.Yes, it tells me your diverting the discussion away to something irrelevant.
Scientists have yet to determine how other life forms brains work because they simply haven't had the time to do it. Religions, like the one you follow, have kept science oppressed for a long time.
Most believers, like yourself, jump to conclusions of the supernatural because all the answers to every question have not yet been answered.Hahahaha... haven't had the time to do it? Hahahahaha!
What I'm pointing out is very much relevant. Let's be honest here. The only reason we don't know whether other life forms have a mental experience like we do is because, unlike other humans, we can't talk to them. The mind is not observable, so we have to depend on what the subject says, meaning there is always a subjective layer. Since animals can't communicate as we can, they can't tell us what's going on in there. It has nothing to do with scientists not having time. I'm not even sure where you got that.
You clearly have some personal issues with religion, though based on inaccurate information ("Religions ... have kept science oppressed for a long time"), that clearly cloud your ability to think and see things clearly.So who's really diverting the discussion here?
For evidence of your mind you said, "The evidence is the brain and how the synaptic neurons work." So let's try a little exercise. Explain to me how the way "synaptic neurons work" proves your mind exists?
Then maybe tell me where you got the idea that scientists haven't yet determined how other life form's mind's work because they haven't had time. I've got a sneaking suspicion that reply wasn't actually based on anything, but I could be totally wrong. It seems to me that if they were capable they'd find the time as they would give us all kinds of insights into our own minds as well. If the lack of time thing is true then I'll be the first to donate to the "let's buy our neuro-scientists the time to do what they need to do" fund.
"No I don't have material evidence. I have intuition. Intuition that says being alive is something more than purely mechanical. That all the things we think and feel and desire are more than just unintended bi-products of an evolving brain. With no soul, no non-physical component of the self, all we're left with is cold mechanical deterministic biology. "
Do you just want to believe something to make you feel good? You really are not after the truth? If it is just "cold" mechanical biology, so what? This is what cold mechanical biology feels like. Hardly cold is it?
How can knowing the truth stop you from loving? You make meaning for life, nothing and no one else.
And who says there isn't something else going on? Something we don't know about yet? After all. cold mechanical biology made us. There are some interesting possibilities in that.
I have the same feelings you do. Same intuition. Life is not a mechanical clock. Chaos theory tells us that. But what is going on at the root? We don't have a clue yet. Speculation isn't going to get the answers. So I am willing to wait and see.
I've spent my life looking for the framework of existence and I think I have some of it. From that I can fill in the details as I go.
If we find a conscious god and souls then fine. Plenty of time to discover them. But I am not going assume them just because it would be so much easier than waiting for the facts.
I may never find the answers, but I am not willing to guess and be happy with that. Are you?To be clear, though my long-windedness may make it seem so, I didn't cover my entire viewpoint. This is step one. That doesn't mean step two is rampant speculation. My approach is a very methodical one and truth and understanding are my goals. This has been a life-long fascination for me that I've only in recent years discussed with others. I critically assess everything.
I'm simply pointing out here why I think there's more to the story than the purely material picture we have so far. Life is far too dynamic to fit in that box. But there's a whole progression here well beyond just that. This is just why I cannot get on board with a purely materialism viewpoint. I see the value in it where scientific inquiry is concerned, but have what I feel is good reason to keep my mind open to more than just that picture. There's a progression that takes me from materialist to deist to theist to the God of the bible in particular. A book's worth of writing to cover it all, but it is a logical progression that I have formed over many years.I just posted a theory for you that I worked on for years. The one about the universe being god, creating out of need to gain an ultimate balance and to perhaps in a metaphorical way, eventually create the god-state. We were created by nature, to create a perfect nature.
Not now, of course, not humans, but everything. And the likely hood is no such perfection is possible.
I can go through all the evidence for you from a scientific perspective. I even helped create a religion around it that is always gaining popularity: Scientific Pantheism.
I worked for years on it. Now I sit and wait to see if it is true. I don't put faith or belief in it. I don't know. It's just a model derived from the facts we have so far.
Perhaps eventually you will have to distance yourself from your model, and say you don't know.
"What I don't get is we keep probing deeper into the brain, and I guess because we found it to be something other than a "snot box" as you put it, or a little man puppeting our bodies, or a soul gland I guess, people reach the conclusion that there is no soul. And then say people like me who believe there is a soul keep changing our tunes. I'm not sure what you expect to see if there had been material/physical evidence."
Well the soul is just an old guess or wish, as it were. The brain was developed to move the body of cells and to protect it all costs. But it has gotten so good at it and so self absorbed that it thinks it is the most important part of the system. So it wants to avoid death at all costs. That's why it invented souls and gods and such.
As for why I said the idea of soul keeps changing, you have one idea of what it is and if I ask 10 other people they all have their own idea. Some do not believe animals have souls. Most, in fact. You are an exception.
Before modern physics mediums and spiritualists told us the soul is energy. The thing that animates us. Matter was just base material. Now that we know energy and matter are the same thing in different form so energy is considered to be in the material realm, spiritualists have started saying spirits and souls are not energy, they are something else.
When one is arguing with Christians or spiritualists, since they all have a different story it is hard to get a good debate going because you have to tailor your arguments to what they believe, which could be just about anything. There is a hell, there isn't, it isn't like that, you are just separate from god and that feels like hell.. You name it I've heard it, and I picked hell but you can name any subject you like and it's the same thing. Spirit and souls is no different.
Even cultures have a different take on things. The Egyptians used to think the soul was everything. Thought, feeling, memory, life, everything. The brain was a mucus gland.
At least we found out that's not true.
So again why must you insist on an answer that is pure speculation? We are finding out more and more about the brain.
Perhaps we will find a soul some day, but until then, why assume it exists when there is no evidence for it except your brains desire not to expire?
Consciousness as developed as ours is a double edged sword. With it comes the knowledge that you will die some day. That's not easy for some to live with. An other animal probably never thinks about it. What a burden it puts on us. We would anything for it not to be true. Loved ones, not gone to heaven, just gone. It's harsh for some.
For me. I've made my peace with death. I'd almost rather it was the final end. The body gets tired. Time for an eternal nap doesn't sound bad to me, eventually. And if I wake up dead then so be it. I'll find out I guess, but I'm not expecting it.
And in a philosophical light, life is far more valuable if it is fleeting. Life seems cheep if it goes on for ever regardless. Why do people morn the dead if they went to a better place? Do Christians really believe that? Because they sure don't act as if they do. You should have a party for the dead. They made it. But no. People seem to get it regardless of their belief. Someone died. Its the end.
I also know that even though I will no longer be around, the energy that is me will go on for ever, merging with other systems. There is lots to speculate about there as well, like: how much of my existence remains as info in that energy? The I will be gone, but in a very real way I won't be.
What if energy is god? Then when I die all of me goes back to god. lol... I'm just saying, there are many perspectives you can take if you want to. I'll tell you a really cool one.
What is the nature of energy is god, and it is in turmoil? It tries to get balance by creating all this. We are gods problems which it solves one at a time, through our existence and our actions and thoughts? To not die wouldn't make sense. To not go back to the all wouldn't make sense.
This is all just metaphor and speculation. But you see where I'm going here don't you?"Well the soul is just an old guess or wish, as it were."
That right there is an assumption. I get the logic behind it, but it's important to understand what exactly these kinds of conclusions are and what they're based on. I get that our conscious minds construct our concept of reality based on information it's gathered through the senses throughout life experience. And to that conscious mind even our own bodies are something foreign, another component of the outside world that it has to learn over time. So this would make it seem as if there's an inherent duality in us. And like you said, having the capability to reason makes us aware of our eventual demise. So I get the concept of how a conscious mind could dream up the concept of a soul. It does make sense. But that doesn't mean that's the answer.
As you pointed out, energy isn't destroyed. It must go somewhere. You also pointed out that matter-energy are the same thing in different forms so now energy is placed in the material column. But it's not like the ability to detect it means we totally get it. What we do know for sure is that things like neural activity, neural cells firing pulses of electricity, actually store and allow access to information in some way. Information we can't observe from the outside, at least not yet. But what appears to be simple biological/chemical/physical happenings from the outside is actually tons of stored information. A database of everything we've ever experienced throughout life. Every site, sound, smell, feel, taste. And we can take this visual/audible information and actually change it. We can introduce purely imagined things that have never been seen or experienced through the senses. We're actually able to access this information. We can't from the outside. In fact the only reason we know there's stored information in there is because we each experience the mind. But that information is in some way written on/in the matter-energy of our physical brains.
So, what this would seem to suggest is that things we experience, decisions we make, what we know/learn, in some form or another becomes part of reality. First in the matter/energy of our brains, then possibly retained in the fabric of matter/energy itself. I personally suspect we're all more interconnected than it would seem. Possibly a shared unconsciousness like Jung used to speak about. Possibly shared harmonious frequencies in our vibrations. There is a lot to consider. And in considering these kinds of possibilities it leads to considering just how significant of an impact our behavior can have on the world around us.
Unlike the rest of the natural world that behaves according to instincts and natural law, we humans decide our choices and behaviors through reason. Since the dawn of reason we've, in a sense, taken the proverbial wheel. And like you said we see our individual selves and those we love as somehow more important components of the system. We want to continue to live on, avoid death. In our pursuits to do so, like in medical advancements, we've actually begun to retain detrimental genes that normally would not have been passed on to future generations because they wouldn't have survived. So just in that way what we do has an impact. When considering the concept of actual free will, if we are actually able to behave apart from purely material determinism, then the impact of what we choose to do could have far reaching implications well beyond what we can even imagine.
This begins to touch on the concepts I consider as far as a God, if on exists, that's capable of creating this universe we observe, why this all-powerful God would actually take such an interest in us humans who take up such a seemingly insignificant corner of time and space in the grand scheme of things. If the bible is true, if that God is real, then the free will it speaks of is just the kind of capability that would warrant that level of interest and interaction. Because free will would make each of us a creator. It means we humans actually create and add things to this universe that are not 'of God', but 'of us'. Things that are not 'natural', but 'man-made'. And in considering this concept of free will, it would lend itself well to being an explanation for why God would create this universe at all. If God is as described, capable of seeing all time all at once, then a purely deterministic reality where everything works exactly according to His will would be pointless. Only the existence of true free wills would warrant actually creating reality and letting it play out. And concepts like the one you mentioned about a fleeting life making each of our decisions and actions, each moment of life, more crucial, it seems to me this environment would be ideal for creating and bringing to fruition something like a free will.
I know what you mean about conversations with Christians, or anyone who deals with non-material aspects, as being difficult. Because, unlike material science, anything that deals with humanity and the mind has a layer of subjectivity that doesn't allow for the same level of certainty. But it's still undeniably a major component to our overall story that can't just be ignored, so it's not going to be as easy as we'd all like it to be where objective truth can be established with certainty in every aspect of life. There's always going to be a need for philosophical reasoning as well. We just have to be sure to use objective truths as a touchstone to keep us tethered and not let us go too far off into the clouds of pure speculation.
Sorry to carry on and on. I could write on this topic all day, so believe it or not, this is the "short" version and I actually did try to restrain myself to keep this relatively "brief".
Your correct, but the problem we can't alway trust our minds can we. I've been tricked by my own mind many times. Are those memories real? Did we dream the events and think them real? The human mind has a way of preserving and preventing itself from torment. But this no nothing new for a brain to do, humans are not the only animals that will go into shock to prevent itself from torture.
No, we can't always trust our minds, but that doesn't make the mind and the impact it has on us any less real. The point here is that the mental experience is something that is most definitely not material, yet it is real. The only reason we know it's there is because we ARE the material it's made of, so we actually experience it. So what are the chances this one lump of matter that exists, that we each personally experience, is the only matter in all the universe that has way more going on than what outside appearances would suggest? To the outside it's just firing neurons and oxygenated blood coursing between the lobes. So who's to say lightening isn't a thought? If electric pulses in our brain can carry information that can't be seen, or a neuron can store information we can't see, what else is going on that can't be seen? Not that I'm suggesting lightening is thought and a storm cloud is a brain. I'm just using an example. The same things happening in the physical brain, the same elements at play, happen elsewhere. These are not elements that are unique to us. Yet the unobservable product of these elements is way more dynamic than anything the actual behaviors we can observe would suggest on their own. So what else could be going on that's way more than outward appearances would suggest?
Ah Mister Headlyvonnoggin,
The human mind can be measured, seen and experimented with. Depriving someone of sleep and food and leave them open to suggestions. If you want someone to join a cult you simply deny them food and sleep and force them to chant. The mind is nothing like God at all, can God be measured, seen or experimented with?
So you want undeniable, approved by you (or people like you), kinds of objective evidences for God? This isn't that much different from what I have been saying. Based on what you have said and continue to say, this is what it amounts to. I don't know why one wouldn't just admit (if its true) that the evidences that are convincing to so many others, is just not enough evidence for them personally. When very clearly they (and you) live and act like other things exist that you can't hold a piece of in your hand, or see, etc. (See to your held specifications...) One whole set of different rules apply to this God, that doesn't seem to be applied to anything else. This is why arguments like the pink squirrels are so seemingly clever or attractive perhaps. They might seem like a slam dunk when they are so not a slam dunk at all. The pink squirrel is a horrible example to compare things to and you have been shown how already. Yet it works for you, and I think people are encouraging you to have a better kind of testing system maybe. That is too easy and a soft ball.
"So you want undeniable, approved by you (or people like you), kinds of objective evidences for God?"
Undeniable will suffice. And since you don't have any I may have to give you some later this evening.
I'll revisit this post later tonight when I have more time. You still aren't getting that no example I might give would be better for you, because you believe, so to have your god compared to anything else is an insult to you. I assure you it isn't. It's just logic.I totally disagree that any example you might give wouldn't be a better one than god poop, or invisible pink squirrel from your basement poop. That you suggest it is just logic is what is insulting. It also has nothing to do with god being compared to anything else. What you said there makes me think you aren't really reading the responses given to you. By the way, God could very well exist while never giving any evidence whatsoever of himself to you. That he has in many ways for many people, "those things" will never be the undeniable evidence you crave or insist on. Its part of my point to you. People are encouraging you to be reasonable I think, that that is a fair thing and good for you and all of us.
Invisible pink squirrels may well exit too. You can't prove they don't, and if M theory has its way they do, somewhere, in some other universe. just because I can think of them.
Oh wow, I guess I did engage and asked for that. At least I know for a fact now that you aren't really reading any of the many responses to you. (Really reading the responses in a way to consider their ideas as possible or plausible.)Aye yai yai, big sigh here.
Kind hint...no one has ever suggested there are invisible pink squirrels in your basement. No one. I am speaking very literally there. It is not an argument. Compare those facts to the idea of a possible intelligent being that is the cause for all we see. A ton of varying arguments have been given to suggest that, some are inherent in our universe, and for sure science. The toleration of the pink squirrel argument, and how kind people have been, seems totally lost on you. I can't help more than that, but I sure tried. I am amazed.
I think the idea of the opposite views even POSSIBLY having rational arguments on occasion get the same "talk to the hand" response as other things we see. It must be not be allowed. Insisted upon control where we clearly are not in control at all. (Illogic and irrational.)The only thing that religion being wide spread like it is shows me is two things:
- It is a survival mechanism. It's easier to believe that there is a Higher being in control. Great stress reducer. If you know anything about stress, it is HORRIBLE for the body of a human or nonhuman animal.
- People tend to be ethnocentric especially when it comes to using anthropomorphism as a means to explain that which they had no physical tools to otherwise explain. Humans by nature tend to follow the rules of logic while using false premises. Superstition is evidence of that. Superstition is also widespread. Does that mean that it has any weight to it?
The only people who I'd believe are eastern philosophers. All the time I see science pretty much going along with eastern concepts that have been around for a long time, especially in the behavioral sciences. (If we'd continued to base psychology off of Christian ideas, I'm scared to see what it would look like today.)
Let me tell you why I run my thinking the way I do.
When I was a kid I believed in god, I even wanted to be a priest. But by age 6 I started to find out that there were other forms of Christianity. I had a lot of questions because their forms of Christianity didn’t mesh with mine. I was a Catholic and they were Protestants.
When I asked my mother why their idea of god was different from ours she said she didn’t know, but that there were actually many religions that didn’t even believe in the same god.
I asked her who was right. She said no one really knows.
That shocked me. I thought all people knew the same god I believed in. Now to find out that no one really knew which religion was right, well that made my penny drop. How could I find out if no one knew for sure? If there was one god, why were there so many religions?
Where does one start to look for truth if no one knows the answers? You have to try to find it for yourself. But where do you start?
I started by studying other religions. Maybe if not one of them was right, all of them together might provide the answers; each providing some small part.
I then studied Buddhism and Hinduism as well as looking into Confucius. I love Zen Buddhism because it taught me to reconcile paradox.
But I started developing a method for my inquiry. I promised myself I wouldn’t stay in any religion until I had the answers.
From Hinduism I learned meditation techniques that allowed me to experience amazing things. I thought I had it at last. But I soon started noticing things. I could live almost any imagination I wanted to. I even lived for a time in a Tolkien fantasy world as an experiment.
I’ve written a book about all my experiences so I won’t bore you by repeating it here. But I discovered that my mind was not to be trusted. I could interpret my experiences as spiritual, and they were. But they all mind, and all of my making. Sure I could leave my body almost at will, but I knew that if I died in that state, my mind would not continue to live. It was just something I knew.
And I the one thing that would have proved to me that it was not all my own imagination would have been had I been able to levitate. It would have proved mind over matter, but I couldn’t do it.
I studied formal logic and philosophy. I thought it might help me think things through a little better. And it helped a lot.
And then I started studying physics. It blew me away. These people had a method for getting objective answers.
By this time I was 18.
I kept my promise to myself. I did not fall to any religion or philosophy, and science didn’t even want my faith or my belief.
So at that point I developed a strategy.
1) Don’t assume anything.
2) Forget the old ideas for now and be open to new ideas, but fall to none of those either. Don’t marry any ideas, no matter how good they might sound.
3) Be ready to drop any idea at a moment's notice if it turns out to have no validity. Better to know nothing than to believe nonsense for the sake of feeling good.
4) Accept what is, even if you don't like it. You may not like that the earth is round, but get over it. Liking has nothing to do with truth. Something either is, or is not true. Your feelings about it do not in and of themselves change anything.
5) Be only interested in the truth, no matter what it turns out to be.
6) Study the patterns of existence. Not the interpretations
7) Don’t believe anything at all. Faith is not required. It is foolish to have faith in speculation and redundant to have faith in facts.
8) Expect as little as possible.
9) Try to embrace change
10) Don’t be afraid to say you don’t know.
I might have also added, do your best. These are things we must do if we want to find the truth. It is a method for people who are seriously looking for answers and don’t know where to start.
Do I put my faith in science? No. It is the best method we have yet devised for getting objective answers, but it deals in probability. New data can always change the game.
But I was amazed to find out that basically my ten point method for the seeker was the same as the scientific method. The wording is slightly different, but the intent is the same.
Religion, philosophy and science have one thing in common. Each gives us a model of the world. A model is designed to explain the facts. So it has facts in it, which makes some models look very attractive. But the model is not usually required. The facts are explanation enough for the time being.
In science there are a lot of interpretations and models. It is wrong to take many of them as fact. Scientists don’t even do that.
So to me, interpretation and subjective experience are always suspect. We can make ourselves believe anything. So we have to be careful. I will never deny that someone has had an experience. I only find their interpretation of that experience to be of concern and up for scrutiny.
So did I find god? Of course. I know theists have no proof of god, but I promised you a logical proof. And this from the atheist, right?
We did not always exist. So if you define god as that which created or produced us and all of this, then a god exists by definition.
The logic is not refutable.
So here is the problem. The next question is, what produced or created us? Was it a conscious super being? Or was it a process?
If a conscious being, then which one of the 80000 or so gods mankind has worshiped? You might narrow it down if you take away the 60000 or more Hindu gods who are all a manifestation of the one, but that still leaves several thousand in contention.
Or is it one no one has thought of yet? Who knows?
Can it have been a natural process?
Well, Aquinas had it right. If there ever a time that there was nothing at all, then there would be nothing now. You can’t get something from absolutely nothing. Therefore god.
But Aquinas didn’t know there was a contender.
As I said, many models in science are not considered facts. But the laws of thermodynamics have been proven so often there is no longer any question about them reflecting reality. And they say that energy can’t be created or destroyed.
Even the BB states that the singularity consisted of all the energy now in the universe. No more no less.
So energy may indeed be god. That is to say, the nature of energy or process of existence, is god.
Now, we have plenty of evidence as to how energy creates all kinds of things through its activity. It is extremely creative.
But what evidence do we have for a conscious god? Very little to none that is not subjective.
Is the bible evidence? No. It is only evidence of people who believed there was a god. Testimony by people who believed in a god and who died several thousand years ago is suspect at best.
The facts of Jesus? That’s the problem. He may not have even existed. Few to no records of him outside the bible. Some Roman records to which most scholars say the parts about dealings with Jesus were added hundreds of years after the fact.
But even if we assume a man called Jesus existed, some scholars have pointed to him being a minor figure who was embellished for political reasons .
Let’s say he was the leader of a new way of thinking. Some of the things he said would lead us to believe him a mad man. There is some debate as to whether he actually meant that he was god or not. But people saying they are god are usually regarded as a little off mentally these days. In those says it was common.
Also this trinity thing is a Roman invention. There was no talk of it in the bible or in pre-Roman Christian literature. The Jews under Matthew certainly didn’t believe it.
I love history, and if you knew the history and politics that created your bible you wouldn’t be able to look at it the same way.
We could argue the same for any other holy book and god model.
I do not know whether Jesus actually existed or not ad I wasn’t there to hear him so I don’t know what he said. But the bible ha a lot of ideas that were coming to the forefront in the region through other cultures. So to me he is at least a focal point for those ideas, and some of them were pretty good.
But no there is no evidence that he was god, or a god, or anything more than a man. There are just stories that might or might not have any truth to them at all and if they do they were just as likely embellished over time.
So you are right to think this is just me discounting all this evidence, and you can take it all as gospel. One of us wrong. But finding out which one isn’t easy.
The only way is through positive objective facts. And we don’t have any. I can’t prove your god does not exist and you cannot prove it objectively does. We’re even. What’s wrong with that?
That means, unless you have now found a way to give objective proof of your god, the way to prove god is out of your hands. The only one who can prove he exists is god. So if a conscious god exists I encourage it to show itself to all, and explain who he or she or it is and what they want.
That’s not me making up the rules, the rules I use are the rules of logic.Are you married? If not, can I marry you? LoL.
Seriously, though, that was extremely well put. Thanks for sharing.
Question: did you ever look into Taoism/Daoism? How you described energy sounds a lot like "The Way" aka "The Dao/Tao."
This is the English version of the Tao Te Ching
http://www.taoism.net/ttc/complete.htm
This is a nice summation of "the" Tao/Dao
http://www.bbc.co.uk/religion/religions … /tao.shtmlThank you Slarty for sharing all of that, it is very interesting to know the background and gives some insight into how you think some and what you have experienced.
There is so much that could be touched on in here. I like many of your above points too, the numbered ones, and the very last part of the last sentence. I cannot disagree those are good ways to evaluate the facts and things we observe.
The thing is, that we disagree on when you are breaking your own rules, and you probably think the same of me. My biggest problem is watching people rig the game to win, set rigid patterns that reality has to line up with, all the while saying they aren't doing it. Not saying you do this, but some do, and you do some also. If you like, I will point it out if and when you do it, and I hope you would do the same. I am just glad to see we hold some of the same ideals.
Maybe I will even use the quote from you even, if ok, "the rules I use are the rules of logic." That is a not a bad rule! I would add too, not everyone has the best answers all the time. I am short on time, but hope to talk about some of these points more later, perhaps. I really did like your list there, who knew we could agree on so much? Thanks again for sharing that.Thank you so much for all of this...it has taken you a long time to write, and it seems to be coming from a deep honesty.... if you don't mind, I will copy and paste it to my own file and keep it for future reference.... not as a sort of Sacred Text, but just as a reminder and clarifying essay for my own use from time to time.
And of course able to be changed/disagreed with ad infinitum if ever I feel like it.*Props chin up on both fists, bats eyelashes, and sighs*
What a breath of fresh air you are. I'm fascinated. I'm intrigued. I'm captivated. I'm mesmerized. Dare I say it? Yes, I shall, I'm impressed. Wow, just wow. Thank you for posting this.
I'll admit, I feel the urge to flirt with you now. I just bet you get that a lot, huh? I'll try to refrain and just keep it to respectful compliments so as not to make things awkward. No promises.
Ahem. Anyway, where was I? Oh yes, I'd very likely be interested in the book you spoke of, is it mentioned on your profile page? I'll check into that, if you don't mind of course.lol... I;m glad you enjoyed the read, Yes there is a link to my books on my profile page if you are interested.
And thanks.
Interesting.
Do you believe there are protons?
Can you see one?This webpage has lots of pictures of proton collisions at CERN:
http://www.atlas.ch/photos/events-collision-proton.htmlI don't see any protons there. Just bubbles in a chamber.
If you say you can see a proton, then you are the very first in the history of humanity. Your eyes are better than an electron microscope.
You can't even say what a proton IS.
You can say it's two up particles and one down.
Then you have to define what THOSE are.
You can define them by their spin or color etc.(without ever having to say what those things actually are). Deduce their measurements (without ever measuring them directly.)
But you will probably never be able to actually see one.
But most people believe they're there.That's nice, scientists are looking at the effects of protons.
Nice to see you have a sense of humor.
You may educate yourself:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Proton
http://hyperphysics.phy-astr.gsu.edu/hb … roton.html
Again, you may educate yourself.
Again, you may educate yourself.
No, they observer them to be there.You can't see a proton. You can't see a subatomic particle. Therefore they haven't been observed. You infer that they are there due to circumstantial evidence.
You can draw pretty pictures and diagrams of particles all you want. You can't provide a photograph of a particle. You can't even draw a picture of what one might really look like, because we just don't really know.
You believe they exist because of circumstantial evidence.
Furthermore, when you break down particles, what are you left with?
When you have a proton, you have a "thing", with mass.
But what type of "thing" do you have with an UP particle? Or better yet, a photon? A photon doesn't even has mass. So what is it made of?A photon is energy. Very real and you can even see it. If you couldn't you wouldn't be able to read my text. A proton is energy but it has been slowed down by the higgs field and so has mass.
You can't "see" a photon. You can see because of photons.
You say a photon is energy.
Now you have to explain what energy is.
You will tell me that energy is the vibration or motion of an object.
So when a photon is traveling across emptiness of space, say from one galaxy to the next, what is moving/and or vibrating? The photon itself? It doesn't have any mass, so what is there to vibrate? Space? What is "space" made of?E=mc squared tells us that energy and matter are the same thing in different form. Matter is energy with mass. And when you ask what something is you are really asking how it behaves, because there is no other way to tell anyone what anything is. There is nothing but energy.
"There is nothing but energy"
That is impossible, by the very definition of energy. Energy isn't a thing. It is a vibration or movement of something.
You're argument is circular.
If all the mass in the universe were converted into energy, what would you have?You would have a glimpse of the early universe.
Interesting.
So, if at the theoretical point in the early universe where you say "everything is energy", what do you think that would look like?
What is being energized? What is moving around, being heated up (or cooling down), what is it that is vibrating?
Describe the nature of "energy", that exists without mass to move around.Light. Some forms of radiation. Radio, microwave and other forms of EMF.
Might look like the inside of a star; as all of space was filled with it it could not be seen from far away. Brilliance, then, from every point in the universe. Maybe. And maybe it was dark matter, or all microwave radiation, whereupon it would be black to our eyes (if our bodies could exist in such intolerable conditions, that is.
That has been the conventional wisdom. Energy is defined as work. But we are starting to understand that it is not just work, it is the matter doing the work as well. Energy is a thing. Again, photons have no mass, no matter as it were. So that leaves energy.
What happens when you put matter and anti matter together? They completely annihilate each other. But something comes out of this action. Photons are produced. Remember that according to the laws of thermodynamics energy can not be created or destroyed, and so the laws of conservation always converts the energy to something else, an other form of energy.I can't see energy as a "thing". It is a property. There are other properties, like spin, or parity. I suppose you could even say mass is a property. But the real question is what are these things properties of?
All these things seem to depend on the other things for them to work. But when you break it all down, you can't really find any constituent parts to work with. It like untying a bunch of knots, only to come up with nothing at the end.They are properties of energy. Think of energy and matter like ice and vapor. Same thing, different form.
In theory, in the first few moments of the BB there would have been nothing but energy traveling at the speed of light and no way for any of it to interact. The Higgs field kicked in and slowed most of the energy down to sub-light speed. This drag as it were, is like you trying to run in water.
So depending on the kind of substance we are talking about, each particle takes on mass. Mass is the measure of matter in a system. Some things like photons are not affected.
But without the Higgs field there would be no mass and no matter. All you would have is energy traveling too fast for interactions to take place.Interesting.
I think I am starting to see what you're saying.“There is a fact, or if you wish, a law governing all natural phenomena that are known to date. There is no known exception to this law – it is exact so far as we know. The law is called the conservation of energy. It states that there is a certain quantity, which we call “energy,” that does not change in the manifold changes that nature undergoes. That is a most abstract idea, because it is a mathematical principle; it says there is a numerical quantity which does not change when something happens. It is not a description of a mechanism, or anything concrete; it is a strange fact that when we calculate some number and when we finish watching nature go through her tricks and calculate the number again, it is the same. (Something like a bishop on a red square, and after a number of moves – details unknown – it is still on some red square. It is a law of this nature.)
(…) It is important to realize that in physics today, we have no knowledge of what energy ‘is’. We do not have a picture that energy comes in little blobs of a definite amount. It is not that way. It is an abstract thing in that it does not tell us the mechanism or the reason for the various formulas.” -Dick Feynman
What about that?
I think what you say is interesting, but I'm wondering where you got the idea.
Is it something you worked out on your own?Nothing he said contradicts what I said. And no, I am taking it from Relativity and the laws of physics.
The point I'm trying to make is that quantum mechanics is based on circumstantial evidence. It is based on the measurements that are made through experimentation, of things we can't see. It is based on mathematics. There is no direct evidence, things can only be inferred.
But there is enough of the circumstantial evidence, and it is consistent enough, to make it believable that particles actually exist. Most reasoning people would accept that they exist.
Millions of people in the world believe that scientists and mathematicians are most likely, and leaving little doubt, correct that we are made up of particles that we can't see.
What I'm getting at is that is that there are still plenty of people who INSIST on "God poop" for proof of a creator. Direct evidence that a creator exist, before they would consider believing it. That they would have to have God standing before them in order to accept it as proof.
But how much indirect, circumstantial evidence would it take to convince this type of person? For many, it would be that no amount would ever convince them. God poop or nothing.
My theory is that this type of person simply has an EMOTIONAL aversion to the thought of a creator.That's simply not true. Don't you think everyone would like to die and go somewhere wonderful and exciting? Just because we want something doesn't mean we get it. It's not fun looking at the lies that are given to ease our minds of fear, but once one has gone through "the death of God" one comes out the other side stronger and more in touch with reality and one own mind. It's like taking a soother out of a toddlers mouth who is to old for it. You can allow the toddler to keep the soother until they are adults, but they sure will look silly heading off to work with a soother.
Your response has absolutely no relevance to anything I said.
Nowhere did I mention anything about heaven, death, or anything of the sort.Dr Lamb said "That's simply not true. Don't you think everyone would like to die and go somewhere wonderful and exciting? Just because we want something doesn't mean we get it."
You indicated we don't want to believe that's why we won't look at the evidence. I'm letting you know that's not true.
Well experiment and results is direct evidence. We make things based on this evidence and they work.
Circumstantial evidence is something else. It's not the result of experiment.
So What ever particles actually look like we know something is there and how that something behaves. We can call it what ever we like.
Math is a language and Pythagoras called it the language of god. That was what? 500 BCE? A hundred years before the OT was written. And sure enough it does do amazingly well at describing the universe.
A god is a different problem. Particularly since nature seems to be all that's required. We can't test for god. So unless one shows up and says hi we can't be sure it exists.
I'd be more than happy if someone would prove a god exists. Why not? But so far it seems impossible without an appearance to the world in no uncertain terms. That really shouldn't be hard for a god to do. So if just doesn't to, then we are all out of lick for real proof.
I think it should be and is rather easy to look for the evidence of God. As a matter of fact we should be able to detect who has the correct version of God. Just look for the absence of a particular religion from hospitals. Prayer is said to move mountains, so statistically it should keep those on the correct path out of hospitals.
P.S. I've looked at the statistics and talked to doctors and nurses. Cancer doesn't discriminate against any group. All religion does is cause guilt to those already suffering.That's partly true, but not fully. Religion also provides a way for people to reduce stress in times of sickness, ensuring that they are more likely to recover from that sickness (unless it's like last stages terminal) when they truly believe it's in God's or the Universe, or whoever's hands. Religion has evolved with us. That's why you'll find it everywhere, in all shapes and forms, and to meet certain needs and purposes. It is likely only because we have created a society where we can be so comfortable and need free nearly all the time that we have the time to contemplate on the truth values to these myths. If there was no time to ponder, no time to question, no access to vast amounts of information, there'd likely be a lot more religious people. But knowledge and comfort allow us to ponder beyond what we've been taught. If we never knew when our next meal was going to come no matter how hard we worked with no results, you better believe belief in a God or some higher being is going to bring hope (often false hope) that everything will be ok so that we have the will to go on. Religion is a survival mechanism. Though maybe not the best one from all the wars it's caused.
The idea that religion happens to help people in times of need for various reasons, in no way negates the possibility of a particular religion being true. A religion, at least like Christianity is harder to follow than it is not. Many would like the ideas of atheism to be true for what comes with them. This post is kind of making some assumptions is all. That a religion can be a help during a hard time, is in no way a proof against it.
I found the part about being a more "need-free" society than in the past, is part of what has freed up people's minds to contemplate the more intellectual things (or however you said it), a rather interesting suggestion. It could be true in a backwards sort of way, or parallel. I mean that if God is real, and people can pray to him and/or have less stress in very difficult times, then they also back off and "don't need God" during hard times. If this is what you meant then that makes sense to me. People are in a sense using God for what he could do for them, so to speak, and ditching him when times are good. That seems like a behavior that can be observed, though unfortunate, but very human.
Well, to be honest, it is hard for me at this point to take you seriously on this subject. I thought by my asking the questions, you would see the errors in your thinking, as I think this is basically unsound reasoning. You are really seeming to just share your opinion. No one has ever even suggested invisible pink squirrels in your basement, and I observe this is just perhaps a clever way (or you think) of saying it is just as utterly ludicrous to suggest a God.
Truth is though, like I said before, that you just aren't as convinced by the many evidences that people come to the conclusion that there is a God, as they are. But to suggest there aren't any, like there aren't any for said squirrels is entirely over the top. I think we all know this deep down. If you don't, like I said, its hard to take you seriously at this point.
I do appreciate you sharing your opinions though. What question are you saying I didn't answer?
That's my point. To the materialist there is nothing but material. Clearly not something we can know for certain, yet to the materialist there's nothing more to even consider. It's assumed that everything that existence is will eventually fit neatly into a material box. The chances of that actually being true are highly unlikely. The whole reason more and more physicists are turning to explanations beyond our universe is because it's becoming apparent that this one doesn't make sense on its own....
Modern equations seem to capture reality with breathtaking accuracy, correctly predicting the values of many constants of nature and the existence of particles like the Higgs. Yet a few constants — including the mass of the Higgs boson — are exponentially different from what these trusted laws indicate they should be, in ways that would rule out any chance of life, unless the universe is shaped by inexplicable fine-tunings and cancellations.
In peril is the notion of “naturalness,” Albert Einstein’s dream that the laws of nature are sublimely beautiful, inevitable and self-contained. Without it, physicists face the harsh prospect that those laws are just an arbitrary, messy outcome of random fluctuations in the fabric of space and time. - https://www.simonsfoundation.org/quanta … unnatural/
Whatever caused the singularity that first birthed this universe is beyond our scope. The bible made the distinction between the physical and the spiritual long before it was known just how relevant that is.We went through this and yet you are still trying to pawn off speculation as proof of something. it isn't. Just because we don't know yet does not mean god dun it. You know this all too well.
You can speculate all you like. That's great. You may even come up with some thing new someday. But you will only do it by proving it. Philosophy is not enough. And I should know being a philosopher. lol...
I will consider anything that there is evidence for. But I will not lend any credence to speculation without real evidence behind it. That is always the test.
Logic teaches you how to deal with this sort of thing. Your premise has to be based in fact before you can move on or your conclusion is worthless.
It is not that I do not allow that any of your speculative ideas might be correct, but might be isn't: are correct.
I have invisible pink squirrels in my attic. Prove I don't.
The onus is not on you to prove there aren't. The onus is on me to prove there are before my statement is worth anything.
That is how I live my life. Yes. Because it is too easy to fall to speculative ideas and be fooled. Been there, done that, bought the T shirt. So over the years I have developed a philosophy of non-belief. That means I believe nothing. I accept facts and wait and see when it comes to speculative ideas.
Unless I have them myself and then I look for evidence that may prove or falsify my idea.
I do not care what the truth happens to be. I just what to know what it is. And I'm not going to find out by believing in things that are not fact.
And if it is fact then belief doesn't change it one way or the other, so it is not required. It is, in fact, redundant.
I have opinions but I do not invest myself in them. I invest no faith. I can drop an idea at a moment's notice and re-evaluate my whole model of the universe if there is compelling evidence to warrant it. It would not be the first time.
So all I am trying to get across to people is that if they want answers they have to stop making them up and then investing belief in them. And stop selling speculation as fact. It is dishonest. Not saying you do that, just saying I find that sort of thing dishonest.While strongly agreeing with this personal perception you have outlined here, and once again declaring my a-theist points of view, I can still understand Headly's need to see something above and beyond the materialistic. Again not agreeing with most of those presumptions, Headly, just warming to your needs.
I like Headly. He's one of the better theistic thinkers I've met here. But if he wants to find real answers he needs some ground rules or he will be wasting his time like so many others.
As for his need for something other than the material world, I'm not sure that's true, though right now he seems to think he does. But if he gives understanding the implications of the material world a real try, he may find that resolves his need.
Isn't what he really wants, the truth?
I appreciate and understand your logic and your approach and I get how you see the things I'm talking about. But please understand this is not some 'need' in me for it to be something more. I have given, and continue to give, the material concept real consideration. Even early on, when I found myself at odds with the traditional Christian concepts of God or the bible, there are things about a purely material viewpoint I just could never get on board with. It's not that I need something more than it offers. It's that it simply doesn't make logical sense to me. It doesn't adequately encapsulate all that life/reality is. From the outside It appears to cover all the angles, but the whole concept is just too hollow to be the entirety of the explanation to everything we observe and experience.
I do work from what's actually known. The viewpoint I hold now came from my fascination with science and all we've been learning about the natural world. I know it's often assumed, and in a lot of cases accurately, that believers can only see things through their lens, which often distorts their perception. This is not what I'm doing. I've always viewed science through a purely material lens. I can and do think in those terms and I appreciate the value of the material viewpoint. I agree the material viewpoint adequately offers explanations about all the material world we observe now as far as the universe is concerned, as well as the geological and biological elements of this planet. But I think it's a mistake, and I find it quite limiting, to assume that through science we already understand the nature of reality in principal and are just basically waiting for the details to be filled in. It causes one to make a lot of unfounded assumptions and it causes one to discard explanations that have no logical or factual grounds to be discarded.
Think about it this way. What do you think the chances are, really, that this methodology used to determine objective truths about what's observable, established by human minds who came along so late in the game, could actually cover the full spectrum of all reality is in its entirety? Or take mathematics as an example. In your view do you think mathematics is something conceived by humans, or do you think it's something that exists in spite of humans? Invented or discovered? Physics has shown us that mathematical equations can and do capture the fundamentals of reality, and accurately make predictions about reality. So does that mean the universe really does conform to something a brain that presumably just evolved to enable survival is able to contemplate? Just the fact that our late-evolving minds can even contemplate the workings of this universe even to a limited degree suggests to me it's too ordered and structured to be the result of purely haphazard cause.
I get the reasoning behind dealing only with what can be established as objective truth as the best approach to keep yourself tethered to reality, as the mind can and does go off in all kinds of directions without it. What I don't get is how someone can think this one branch of science, the natural sciences, can encompass the entirety of reality when such a big portion of reality as we experience it is made up of dealing with non-physical/unobservable minds that in themselves don't fit that material/observable/detectable/measurable/quantifiable mold. The unobservable mind is the primary reason why the social sciences are a whole other branch. So, if there's at least one thing in reality that does not conform to the purely material viewpoint, why would anyone think a purely material viewpoint could account for the entirety of reality?I had meant to come back to this post and then I never did. It is an excellent response to many posts about the material view, or worldview. I just wanted to say thanks for taking the time to answer the point of someone about it being a "need" for there to be more than what is shown in the natural observable world. I think you explain how the material view falls short when you really look at the huge scope of life and all it entails. Not just the stuff that can be shown to the five senses.
"...stuff that can be shown to the five senses."
That's an excellent way to phrase it. I might have to borrow that, with your permission of course.Thank you, and absolutely
Borrow away, (though no permission needed)
Thanks from me also Headly. I too understand your viewpoint.... everything there is reasonable and deserves a lot of thought.
My biggest difficulty, and this can only be from my impatience with some individuals, is dealing with the lazy mind that will not/can not allow for wider thought and infinite possibility.... where the religious, dogmatic, popularist, over the counter understanding is held rigidly to be the only "right" way.
Sure, I concur that the entire structure and workings, the anatomy and physiology if you like, of this finite world, can be our playpen, classroom, university, library and museum of all that our species has been able to accumulate by way of awareness.
We don't have to cocoon anything into miniscule bundles of dogmatic fact. There is always at least one more point of view to consider.Thank you for your open mind and your thoughtful consideration. It often comes like a breath of fresh air in here, and it makes for potentially fruitful discussion and often gives your contributions to the conversation real relevance. I too have a problem with anyone who staunchly upholds their viewpoint as the "right" way when no human in known history has had any more of a leg up than anyone else. In my mind you should continually re-consider as new insights come to light, and be willing to adjust and reassess. It's when you convince yourself that you've got it all figured out that you stop learning and growing. And I don't think believers are the only ones susceptible to this pit-fall.
Regarding humans in history, what about Jesus? Did he have any advantage, or is he not considered an average human, or something else?
Just an average human, caught up in the corrupt society of his day, who would squirm in his grave if he knew people were worshiping him as god.
If he is in a grave! I've got a sneaking suspicion that..... well you know
I happen to think what Jesus accomplished is made significant by the fact that he was human. It seems a half-God would have an advantage, so living a life without sin wouldn't seem quite so difficult for him.
In fact, that's what I think the 613 laws given specifically to the Israelites were all about. I think that was God creating Jesus in an environment where free will had already been introduced and was therefore not totally in God's control. Where before all the natural world behaved exactly according to His will, once Adam and Eve were introduced, they and everyone 'of Eve' had a free will and could, and often did, behave contrary to God. So I think the story of the Israelites was all about keeping them safe, increasing their numbers as God promised to Abraham, and I think all the laws regarding who to procreate with and who not to, what to eat and what not to, had to do with God, in a sense, breeding Jesus. He was 'creating' in a world dominated by free will one who could do what Adam could not.
That's my take, anyway.I like that "....my take anyway." Fresh thinking for me - I have never encountered that aspect before, so most interesting. Still a-theist, but that's ok too.
Well, that is interesting. So many thoughts, and then questions for clarification on ideas here.
What do you think Jesus accomplished, that Adam could not? What else did Jesus accomplish, in case you also meant more than just what Adam could not?
Do you think free will negates God's control? Or is it "allowed", (kind of like evil is allowed.....). Couldn't God allow things like those things, and still be in control, and it is just a "timing" thing? I mean in the sense he allows for a lot of things, for many purposes that are clearly good and/or known to him only sometimes.
Finally, do you think Jesus' being was created, vs. an eternal being? Like angels maybe, and other spiritual beings?My approach is to use science, both to understand the proper context of the stories being told by knowing the history of the region, and I look to how things work in the natural world to gain better understanding of God and His methods. Like St. Augustine said, I think God reveals His nature to us through both the 'book of scripture' and the 'book of nature'. The most fallible element in the equation, I think, is human interpretation. That includes translations of the bible as well as the traditional ideologies of the various denominations of religion. St. Augustine also said the interpretation of biblical passages must be informed by the current state of demonstrable knowledge. So I think it's important to reassess when new information becomes available.
In applying this method the way I read the story, the creation account describes a natural world that works exactly according to God's will. He spoke and it became what He wanted it to be. This includes the humans created on 'day 6'. After creating all these things it says God deemed all He created 'good', including the humans. The 'day 6' humans were given very specific instructions, be fruitful and multiply, fill/subdue the earth, establish dominance in the animal kingdom. These very accurately describe what homo sapiens actually did. By roughly 20,000 BC they had accomplished exactly what the 'day 6' humans were told to do. I think the creation of Adam is a separate incident, and not just a retelling of the creation story. It's not that Adam was the first human created, I think what's significant is that he was the first to have a free will, meaning unlike anything else in the natural world, he could behave according to his own individual will. This is what I think the Eden story is illustrating. God created an environment where just one rule existed, and placed Adam and Eve in it. And they broke that one rule of their own free will, and they did it because of what they would personally gain. It looked good to eat and it gave one wisdom. Once this creation of God's acted contrary to God, they were separated from Him. That's when their 'eyes were opened'. They were severed from the natural world. Disconnected from it, and from God.
In the context of the natural world I think of free will in the context of the body of a complex multi-celled organism, with the body being the universe/earth/natural world made up of cells, each being all the components of the natural world. Much like a body made up of trillions of cells, the natural world is a delicately balanced system made up of numerous parts. They all work in harmony with one another, like cells in a body, because it all conforms to one set/constant set of laws. In the natural world those are the fundamental forces, or the laws of physics. In the body that law is the DNA code of the body. As long as everything adheres to one unitary set of laws, or code, then you have harmony and balance. Free will in the natural world would be the equivalent of cells being introduced into a body that each have their own unique DNA code. Being able to behave contrary to God would be the equivalent of matter being able to decide of its own free will whether or not to conform to the laws of gravity. You can imagine the potential for disorder to the balance of the natural world if each element within it had its own will to decide whether or not to adhere to the laws of physics.
I think free will is the ultimate purpose. It's a capability well worth having, well worth creating, but it's a volatile and powerful capability. A free will makes us creators. We create things that become part of the natural world that are not 'of' the natural world. And its not all bad. I think free will is what has given us science and art and technology and beautiful music and poetry and all the other things we cherish about humanity. But it also gives us wars and militaries and makes laws and governments necessary. I think free will is something outside of God's control by design. I think He wants us to have our own minds and our own wills, but having that capability means we're capable of evil. I think that's what the story of the bible is describing. This is what happened when God introduced free will through Adam and Eve. At one point the descendants of Adam and Eve (sons of God) began mating with the humans of Genesis 1 (daughters of humans), which introduced free will into humanity. This is what I think the beginning of Genesis 6 is describing. This is what made humans 'wicked' and warranted a flood. And this is what made an omniscient God 'regret' putting humans on the earth. It's because free will created an outcome that actually caused Him to regret. It was an undesired outcome, meaning it was something not totally within His control. So He had to send a flood to account for it.
The whole rest of the story depicts God choosing specific individuals, based on them showing favorable traits. First it was Noah, later it was Abraham. He even tested Abraham. Much in the same way a botanist, or someone trying to breed specific characteristics, would operate. They'd choose desirable specimen, then breed from them. He chose Abraham and promised him numerous descendants. The whole rest of the story has to do with what it actually took to keep a large population safe in a very dangerous environment created and dominated by free will. The ultimate goal being to create a being with free will but who still behaves within the will of God, by choice. This is what I think Jesus accomplished. He was the 'last Adam' according to Paul. He was the last in a long line of 'sons of God', as Luke 3 puts it. I think he was bred by God, created through God's interactions with the chosen bloodline, to be the worthy sacrifice that would allow passage for all of us who cannot stay within God's will to still be able to gain passage.
I don't think God judges in the sense that most think. I see God's judgement much like the fundamental laws of the universe. For the system to work, you have to conform. To do so and have a mind and will of your own, you have to do so willfully. You have to choose to behave in a way that's not detrimental to the balance of the system. You have to willfully choose to acknowledge God as the creator and authority and choose to obey the laws in place that are necessary for numerous beings with their own individual wills to coexist. So I think believing in Jesus accomplishes that rather directly. Believing something happened that goes against what we know about the natural world, like someone raising from the dead after three days, means you believe in God and believe He is the creator, having power over even death. You acknowledge His power and authority through simply believing this story. I think that in itself gains you passage. If you do not acknowledge God's authority, much like Jesus described in the wedding parable, though all are invited, only those who conform to the wishes of the one opening up the wedding banquet to all can attend.
That's how I make sense of it, anyway.Thanks for sharing your approach, and explaining it. Just a couple of questions/thoughts.
For the humans that were around previously, and accomplished all the commands given to the 'day 6' humans, why did God command that to the day 6 humans if it was already accomplished? Or are you saying the day 6 humans were around a lot longer than many think? (I may have misunderstood something there.)
The humans previous to the 'day 6' humans, in your view, what drove their actions? Survival, without free will, and no moral choices? How did their thinking operate to live out their lives without free will? (Just trying to follow the idea through, and these are some things I wondered about.) How do you mean Adam and Eve were severed from the natural world, when they broke the one rule? Does this have to do with death entering in?
I never looked at God regretting putting humans on the earth, as that he was surprised how things turned out or out of his control. Like as in completely surprised, and "now what do I do with them?" Although, I can see it on the other hand, and once very far gone morally, or in one's conscience, how do you bring them back around? I imagine it would be a snowball effect that would be hard to undo.
Do you believe Jesus was who he said he was, and also the gospel accounts from his birth to leaving the earth? What do you think accounts for the twists in the distortions of said religion over history? Taking what is a fairly simple message, and distorting it to a degree that it is a total turn off to humanity, and overly complicates it? Sometimes my questions are taken as something other than they are, and mostly they are to think through the ideas, or get clarification and not to assume anything.
As for the rest, a very interesting take. It might answer some questions too about the next world or life after this physical one dies as well. As for the dangers of allowing free will to humans that choose to break the laws of their creator, one would be the temptation to not answer to any other authority and be our own gods, so to speak. Thus the needing to lay down a strong will, which looks like a weak thing but is really a strong thing perhaps in the end. Do not feel the need to respond to all points, I jump around a lot here and ask a lot. Just throwing stuff out there, thanks.
It may be of interest to some people to watch the debate between Ken Ham and Bill Nye the Science guy. I have not read up on the views of Ken Ham, but it could still be an interesting debate. I believe he is a younger earth creationist, and many Christians are not (Though many are, many I know on both sides). It starts very soon, here is a link, and also CNN, may have a live feed.
http://debatelive.org/
Starts soon, 6pm CST
Only sharing this for those that may want to fairly critique the debate later on, and that can be best done if you watch it.I didn't care for it. Both men acted like politicians, sidestepping the question. Nye spent too much time asking for responses he knew he wouldn't get, Ham's response was far too often the old, old "goddunnit", and that simply does not make it.
Something very telling, I thought, was that Ham hemmed and hawed, but was finally honest enough to state that he would never change his mind about god or the bible, no matter what. Nye offered several things that would change his mind. Ham, then, is uninterested in learning, unless the knowledge gained fits within his belief system, and that is NOT how science works.What Ham does not seem to understand is that even if he proves evolution wrong tomorrow, he won't have proven the bible or creationism correct.
I generally don't like moderated debates because they never seem to allow a proper exchange.Amazing, a 6000 year old universe with a flood that levels everything 4000 years ago and everything alive today was a descendant from what was on that boat. And 8 people kept everything alive on that boat for a year. Ham gets up every morning and looks at himself in the mirror. Amazing.
This is what I'm talking about folks, what does it say about the mind if Ham can convince himself that all the evidence we see today is wrong because of what it says in an old book? If his mind can do that what can your do?Biggest problem I found with all that was that species don't change via evolution; there has never been one species evolve into another.
Yet only 1,000 species were put on the boat ("kinds" not species, were what was looked for) meaning that the 1000 species has become 30,000+ species today.
How's that again?To me the problem with scientists even like Dawkins debating Christian creationists is that they do not understand theism. They are good scientists but they are not well enough versed in theology to hit them where it hurt, so to speak.
And of course creationists are not scientists so they don't do well on that front. All in all these debates are unsatisfying most of the time because there is no where to fight on common ground.That's because Philosophy and Science aren't the same field and should have nothing to do with each other. It would be like a dentist and a musician debating mechanics.
I don't know about that. Maybe they should. In some way anyhow. I think it would be a good idea to get people from different disciplines to work together. The disciplines and sciences are too separated as it is.
I see that working between a lot of disciplines, but science and philosophy are fairly incomparable...especially in methodology.
“That's because Philosophy and Science aren't the same field and should have nothing to do with each other. It would be like a dentist and a musician debating mechanics.”
Not exactly. Before we called it science we called it naturalist philosophy. There was a debate in England among philosophers in the 1800s in which the naturalist philosophers were advised by traditional philosophers that they should not call themselves philosophers because philosophy uses deductive reasoning while the naturalists were using inductive reasoning.
Philosophers don’t dig in the earth and do experiments. So science was kicked out of philosophy, but not before one philosopher suggested that since they were doing science, they should call themselves scientists, like artists. And that’s what they did.
These days science is less philosophy and more math, because science has discovered that the world is often counter intuitive. But there is still room for philosophy.
In fact, science gathers raw data. As soon as you interpret that data you are a philosopher. Interpretation is not science. This is illustrated by QM. There are at least a dozen competing scientific interpretations of it, but it does not use or depend on any of them to make it’s predictions.
I’m a philosopher of science, so I have the best of both worlds as far as I am concerned.
So they are not mutually exclusive at all, and philosophy still has a lot to offer science, even if science doesn't depend on us like it used to. But in fact, the scientists of today are still philosophers, even though they often don’t like to admit it.
To fight Ham and his crew, however, I think a philosopher of science with a good theology background would do much better.
Consider me corrected.
My view of Philosophy (for which I have high esteem) is that science acts as a fetter to the process. Philosophers should really just be left unfettered to sit and think s**t up. No proof required. No logic necessary (although it can help, obviously).
My view of Science (which I also hold in esteem) is that it's there to prove stuff. There is no room for philosophical meanderings. Just figure out how things work and state the evidence.
My point is, I guess, is that I don't think the two are necessarily exclusive, but I think they make uncomfortable bedfellows.
Theology and science aren't even necessarily exclusive. I can see quite a bit of potential there for knowledge. That being said, religion and science shouldn't be anywhere near each other.
Did any of that make any sense? I'm not quite feeling par tonight and if the post was a bit disjointed, I apologize.At one time, a few hundred years ago, I would have agreed with you - that philosophy and science, if not bedfellows, should at least be friends.
Now, maybe not. The knowledge necessary, the understanding of the language of math, is enormous to even understand anything partway towards new knowledge. The days of thinking "Wonder what happens when an apple falls" are gone - the fields have become so esoteric that it takes a lifetime of study to understand a small part of one field. And those that take the time and effort to do that study are no longer philosophers.Frequently I "wonder what.....?" This is what keeps me alive! I suggest that when people stop "wondering what...? or if....? or why.....? or how.....? etc." this is when the world of humans takes a backward step into the dark ages of superstition, arbitrary condemnation of any who think differently, and burning at the stake for blasphemy.
Wake up everyone! Become more aware of the factual world around you, which your senses tell you are real..... That arguing about semantics and god-n-ics might be fun but it does not advance knowledge or life itself.
PS - IMHO, of course!
Yes, Ham could have made better points about how even the science we all agree on, points more to intelligence with intentionality than random chance. Was surprised a lot by him actually on a few counts. I think it is interesting to think about what different people mean by creationism, and I think Nye talked about that more even in a sense.
I DO like moderated debates where decorum is esteemed and things are fair. I almost chuckled when I saw that, sorry, about you not liking moderated debates generally. I think many don't, and for the reasons many may not, I DO like them. I hear you though about allowing for proper exchange, and time is a factor as well. I think knowing you have the limitations going on, you have to make the time count that you do have, and I didn't really see that.I was very simple really. And Nye is right in that Ham's thinking could damage science in America. It's already staring when one looks at test scores and compare them to other countries. To follow Ham a lot of the sciences have to be thrown out. I think Nye could have done a better job at explaining how we know how old the earth is and how we know there was no global flood 4000 years ago.
Agreed. I was so disappointed with Nye, actually.
Same here. That hurt when he could only come up with one method of showing the earth is more than 6,000 years old - even I can do better than that. And someone with a question did when he asked about tectonics, ignored by Ham.
Well I don't like moderated debates because of the structure. I would rather see people talking and answering points as they come up. Notice Nye and Ham asked several questions which could not be addressed because of the time limits and structure of the debate.
But yes, unlike here where there is no structure at all and very few rules, I do like a debate that sticks to the points and doesn't get too personal.Very fair reasons indeed, and I wouldn't disagree with you if I am understanding you correctly.
"Yes, Ham could have made better points about how even the science we all agree on, points more to intelligence with intentionality than random chance."
But that is the problem right there. In a cause and effect world there is no random chance, and that is something constantly brought up by Ham and others.
Nye did not do well on that issue because he didn't even try to challenge it.
If the material world is all there is, meaning energy/matter then the nature of energy, the laws of physics, are in essence doing things intentionally. Not the kind of intent that requires consciousness, but all processes/interactions/reactions have a reason in the laws of physics and the nature of energy itself. The nature of energy is what we all refer to as "nature". But it is important to know what it is the nature of.
This makes the natural process indistinguishable from intelligence.
But Ham made it extremely clear that all of his information has come from that "book". He is obviously operating under the assumption that it is true.
I would have to agree with you Wilderness, it wasn't the best debate for either side in my opinion. Interesting they appeared to both be political, not sure I disagree, lol. It was fairly long as well, but interesting in points. The moderator did a great job, lol, and there were some great questions as well, like How did the atoms that create the big bang get there, and how does consciousness come from matter, the 2nd law of thermodyamics, etc.
Not sure Bill Nye made the case about our country will fall behind economically in the world if we don't basically ditch these views held by Ken Ham and have those people join the mainstream. Or how people holding those views won't survive unless they join the mainstream. He referred a lot to the "outside", and kind of pitted the YEC against the whole rest of the world, which surprised me some. Ham could have done a little better I think and spent more time on some things, and less on other things.
In these threads, we are addressing some bigger points even.Actually I didn't like the question about consciousness, not unless it was defined in the question as something beyond soul, spirit, etc. And the 2nd law was too simple; the answer that it isn't a closed system is all the answer needed.
I did like the Q/A period, although there was a lot of "goddunnit" answers. Plus some "I don't know", but those were expected from an honest answer - the questions have NEVER had an answer. The long soliloquy period was almost useless as they could not be answered.
I do think Mye made the case, although he continually pointed at only the most egregious cases in the country and extrapolated from there. I would have liked to hear more about how and why dating procedures are all totally false (or not) by both men, though.
And I really got tired of hearing about "historical science" as if we don't all of us use the same concept every day of our lives. The basic claim seemed to be that we can never have even the faintest idea of anything from the past because we weren't there, which is total nonsense.That historical science was strange to say the least. I've heard that argument before and find it rather sad. I'm not sure how they can look in the mirror and watch themselves say we don't know how the world worked a thousand years ago. Sure, wood burns today but we don't know if it burned yesterday.
I understand why it is used - there is just no other way to discredit the mountains of extremely strong evidence as to the age of the earth - but that doesn't excuse it. Especially when the concept is quietly set aside when contemplating the bible and the people in it.
I do think the telling blow was that Ham's mind could never be changed, regardless of any new information to enter the scene. That just is not the mark of a scientist, or even an intelligent person-in-the-street.
Nye made his case fine, he had to repeat himself because of the audience. They didn't look pleased with him and I think he new this was new information for most of them so repetition was needed. Ham looked a little shaky closer to the end.
It would certainly get rid of all their non-biblical "references!" Maybe it even questions the voracity of the Bible itself. After all, none of us were there, how do they know it's true???
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Bill Nye is no more an authority on science than Ham is an authority on interpreting the bible.
Bill Nye : 1. cesium is used to slow and control the nuclear reaction...the fission... When the 2. cesium 3. can't get in there to slow things down..
Bill Nye is a quack.
1. Caesium-137 is not used for control rods.
2. Cadmium, boron and hafnium are used for control rods in BWRs.
3. The control rods WERE scrammed (rods were in there) in Japan. It was because of the tsunami that water had breached the facility, making pumps fail.
http://www.cnn.com/video/data/2.0/video … s.cnn.htmlI hope Bill Nye and similar views like this don't cause our country to fall behind in the world, economically and otherwise, lol.
Sorry, couldn't resist because that was part of his whole point the whole evening long, and even before the debate.Bill Nye got on national tv and propagated misinformation ie bad science. It wasn't just a matter of confusing some elements, (God help us anyone ever use caesium 137 as control rods) the point is that Bill Nye was used as an expert on that news program and he didn't even understand the basic workings of a reactor. If our country falls behind, it wont be because of Dollywood or some creation museum in Kentucky, it'll be from the drastically lowered bar of wanna-be-experts like nye.
Billions or millions of years cannot be observed and conclusions can only be inferred, however this does not automatically default to someone's personal narrow interpretation of genesis as an accurate calculation of time/history.
Science should be unbiased, not ready to exclude something. Is reality a product of intelligence? all of a sudden, some loud mouth anti-christian scientist is suddenly a constitutional lawyer, worried more about separation, than science.Billions of years can be observed.
http://www.space.com/23306-ancient-gala … -seen.html
"By using data collected by the Hubble Space Telescope and observations from the Keck I telescope at the Keck Observatory in Hawaii, astronomers have now confirmed that the galaxy designated z8_GND_5296 formed within 700 million years after the beginning of the universe, making it the oldest and most distant galaxy ever verified.
Because the galaxy is so far from Earth, scientists were able to observe z8_GND_5296 as it would have appeared about 13.1 billion years ago."
Meaning it took 13.1 billion years for the light to leave that galaxy and get to ours.You can see a star as it appeared billions of years ago, but you cannot see a billion years transpire. We can possibly see the light from a billion years ago from distant stars, but you cannot actually see a billion years or 300 million years transpire, when we are specifically talking about theories that involve those actual time spans. That was the point Ham was trying to make, that conclusions are being inferred which are beliefs, no matter how convincing they are. However that was a point that was not driven home by Ham, in favor of it being used as a tactic to say that YEC is now on equal grounds.
Nye also brought up big bang and hubble btw. Billy Bob Nye likes to suggest that science is some place only for anti-christian or anti-religion kooks like himself.
Monseigneur Georges Henri Joseph Édouard Lemaître was a Belgian priest, astronomer and professor of physics at the Université catholique de Louvain. He was the first person to propose the theory of the expansion of the Universe, widely misattributed to Edwin Hubble. He was also the first to derive what is now known as Hubble's law and made the first estimation of what is now called the Hubble constant, which he published in 1927, two years before Hubble's article. Lemaître also proposed what became known as the Big Bang theory of the origin of the Universe,
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Georges_Lema%C3%AEtreSo we have established the universe is billions of years old and not thousands as Ham claims. That's a good start.
Next lesson?Just once, I'd like to see some fundamentalist stop doing intellectual backflips trying to disprove science and actually produce some evidence of their own that cannot be refuted.
As it is, they are running around saying "That's not scientifically correct because of minor point of contentions, so instead try OUR way that has absolutely no scientific backing at all."
It just seems so desperate. Like if they could prove something wrong, then their faith would be validated. That others would HAVE to believe exactly what they believe because there would be no other option. It doesn't work like that, of course... and they make the whole faith seem like it's grasping at straws.
But whatever...Who was doing that, or anything like it? Which fundamentalist are you speaking of?
As the conversation was about Nye vs. Ham, it would be obvious to most people that I referring to Ham. But, if you want to take it personally (or get defensive defending someone else), have at it. Consider it my community service for the day.
If you just meant Ham, why not say Ham, but you say "some fundamentalist," and all the rest of that post. I knew it couldn't be the others in question, so thus I asked. What is interesting now, is that it should have been easy to just answer, Ken Ham. Glad it made you feel you did your service for the day.
Next time I'll dumb it down for those who can't figure out context clues. Thanks for pointing out that some of the forum participants might have that issue.
Oh, and if you don't want a question answered, don't ask it. If you are just looking for a reason to be indignant, it doesn't really matter what I type anyway, does it?Many great ironies here. Sorry you took my question to be so much more than it was, when I asked what fundmentalist, and who was acting that way. I did want an answer, I didn't expect to get what you gave was all. Have a nice evening Melissa.
LMAO. Right.
I treat people they way they treat others. If you feel you are being treated badly, then you need to examine why that is.
Otherwise, yeah I'm done with you. Since I wasn't talking to you in the first place, I'll resume that course of action.To be honest, I don't really understand a lot of this exchange, and less so now than before. If you took my question to be mistreating you or others, I am not sure what can be done about that. It is fine by me if you are done with me, and I will still wish you a good night even if you don't believe me.
Let's get this straight, your offended by Melissa because she was speaking about a fundamentalist but didn't specify who the fundamentalist is, while agreeing with PhoenixV when he calls someone a troll and says they are incapable of honest intellectual debate?
No. Melissa was speaking about some fundamentalists, and I simply wondered who she was referring to, and who was exhibiting the behaviors she was describing, because the two discussing wouldn't fall into that category, and they weren't really talking about Nye Vs. Ham anymore, but about billions of years, etc. A simple question.
I didn't know that about Monseigneur Georges Henri Joseph Édouard Lemaître, wow. Kind of a very big deal to not get the credit, if due him.
Ah, but once again, secular science wouldn't dare credit a Christian, and the average Christian YEC wouldn't credit him because he's Catholic. Sad, huh?
Yes, and I admit that I am not familiar with that story, but if all that is true, then yes, sad. People shouldn't be treated differently, especially by those that deem themselves as tolerant.
I want you to do an experiment Dr Lamb. I want you to build an aquarium/terrarium. Put in some sand and dirt, but do not include any life or organic material. You can put in some water and lightening bolts if you want. Let us know what you got in 500 million years.
PS. you can look at the stars all you want, as we wait.God done it? You don't understand how life started so… God done it. No need however, it's already been done.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Miller–Urey_experiment
http://blogs.discovermagazine.com/notro … vKpQf2QnW0Its already been done? A 500 million year old scientist? Thats amazing! Anything crawl out of it and paint a Picasso?
He's saying the experiment has been done. Proteins and other prebiotic life was formed.
Even water can self-organize under certain conditions.
Interesting.Yup.
Have a look, Ham says the universe is a few thousand years old.
We've establish it's billions.
You've just said life could not have happened without a God (and your not bothered by God needing to be made)
I've showed you it can be done. No God required to muck up the waters.Radman, You said to Phoenixv,
"You've just said life could not have happened without a God (and your not bothered by God needing to be made)."
I missed where he said that, can you provide the actual quote?
I think there is a reason I missed it but giving you the chance to provide it all the same, as I could be wrong. If you don't want to be called on your errors, or misinformation, etc maybe take a second to reread what you write, so we all don't have to play this time consuming game.
You like to say that people say, "God dun it" when they actually haven't. For someone that likes to debate and discuss, a lot, you need to stop putting totally inaccurate words in people's mouths for one, and really read what they are saying. It is honestly just a kind suggestion that will help you, truly.Apparently they are just a troll, incapable of honest intellectual debate. They cannot provide a link because it's a lie.
I do not understand the behaviors I observe on here sometimes, where if you are kind even, you have to spend an inordinate amount of time reminding people of WHAT YOU ACTUALLY said, and remembering what THEY ACTUALLY said, and go back and find the quotes because they say anything! Stuff just seems to flow out and it is as if its fact, when it is not, they say it with such boldness. They will sometimes butcher what you said or do a 180 on what they just said in their prior post. You have to nearly have a photographic memory and if you did, it would still be utterly exhausting. This is my true experience on these forums on Hubpages, and it discourages me because I love a good discussion or debate normally.
Yeah, I don't understand a lot of the behaviors I see on here either, like Phoenix's post above. I find it rude, personally, but it's not surprising that you think the opposite.
I would agree, it isn't surprising that we think the opposite on this set of posts (and probably lots more) where someone is twisting and distorting the truth and shown how. I think it makes the forums an inhospitable place for people that want to truly debate and discuss honestly with others who hold different viewpoints.
Atheists are perfectly capable of being rude too, and I can and have called them out on it just as easily. Are you genuinely going to say referring to someone as a liar and a troll is polite conversation to you? Take sides out of it. If you wandered into this conversation on this page right now, do you think that post would strike you as rude or not?
If you know what the true definition of lie and troll is, and you saw the exchange, I imagine you would have defended PhoenixV, in all fairness. (If it truly isn't about sides, and I will believe you.) Thanks for asking, but that is my answer.
I have never said "god dunnit" in my entire 5o years of life. I am not a YEC.
Anyone that claims otherwise is a lying troll.
That what he said when he asked me to put some sand in a fish bowl and wait 50 million years to see if there is any life. He was saying it couldn't happen without God.
Asked you? Okay. Dr Lamb/Rad Man
Do you know the difference between what someone actually writes or says, and what you "make up out of thin air" what someone says or writes? Do you not know the difference? How come you dont know the difference between what I actually wrote and what you now claim I wrote?
Let us know what you got in 500 million years.
and
but you cannot actually see a billion years or 300 million years transpire, when we are specifically talking about theories that involve those actual time spans.No, the point was him coming up with an experiment to help you prove your point that we CAN OBSERVE billions of years, which you both were disagreeing on, if you recall. It wasn't about God.
Oh, well if that was the case then I misunderstood. I just can't imagine why anyone would need to see 14 billion years go by to understand 14 billion years have gone by.
No, that wasn't the suggestion. The suggestion made was that we can observe that many years go by, when we cannot. The experiment would have been able to show that or not, and made its point I think, even if we took the long road home to get there.
He made what point? That we have to observe millions of years go by to know they went by? It takes light billions of year to get to us from some galaxies, by we can't trust that because we didn't watch the light come the entire way?
Please go back and read what you said, and what Radman said, lol. He said we can observe billions of years passing by. We cannot. This is not hard or complicated. It was the same point Ham was trying to make in the debate. It is one fair point, absolutely true. He took issue with it, and said we can observe that span of time, but no one can. Its nothing personal, and has more to do with being humanly impossible.
Here's the thing, when we look at the pictures of galaxies billions of light years away we are seeiing what they looked like billions of light years away. We are seeing a picture of something billions of years ago. When we look are stars millions or thousands of light years away we are seeing pictures of them thousands or millions of years ago. When we are looking at layers of rock we are seeing evidence of what life was like through time. When we are looking at tree rings or layers of snow we are seeing evidence of the passage of time. We can take samples from the layers and determine information about what that year was like.
I think you assumed you were at odds with what Phoenixv was saying, but it turns out you maybe are on his side, and admit the obvious, what he was saying about how we can't observe billions of years, in the same way that Ham was saying it. (He said it over and over in the debate.) I think one can get into trouble if we assume that people we are on opposite sides of issues on, are always wrong.
It was one fair point, an obvious one by Ham, and Phoenix was just adding in his two cents on it. I don't agree with Ham about everything, but I do on this. I think all do here. I think Ham didn't bring the importance of the point, "home", so to speak. He didn't bring the point back around to why that is important in these debates.Here is perhaps what you are not understanding. Ham was attempting to point out that because we can't see a video that happened 4000 years ago things may have been so different that out techniques of measuring the passing of time may have not worked. That's simply not the case, the atmosphere of earth can be examined over many many thousands of years through layers of snow/ice and tree rings. If there were a global flood that lasted a year 4000 years ago we wouldn't be about to look at the rings in a 9000 year old tree or examine the snow/ice layer hundreds of thousands of years old.
All I ever said was that you cannot observe a 500 million year experiment no matter how many lies and strawmans you create. Now go debate someone else. I do not debate people like you on Hubpages. If you want to create a chat room somewhere without a rat fink button I would be glad to indulge you.
Unfortunately, asking others to debate intelligently and honestly has been too much for some people on HubPages to handle. To call someone out on a lie, or a troll when trolling, gets multiple report buttons pushed, and then there is supposed success for those that engage in such behavior or defend their friends that engage in such behavior.
Truth gets silenced, once again. I wish at least moderators would read the posts in question and see what the exchanges ACTUALLY entail, or reconsider who is in charge of banning on the HubPages Forums. I mean reading the posts in their context, what came before and after. This is so wrong to those that are so often actually promoting a good discussion and debate on a site that by all appearance (except the banning) seems to want to promote that. The opposite is achieved when you silence those that want to stop the nastiness we sometimes see on these forums. I hope that unless they change, they never wonder why so many good debaters leave the forums. It is just so blatantly obvious. To the few that have the patience of a saint, more power to you, it seems almost super human to me. You are among the best of the best considering what you are dealing with.
I will always wonder at people that seem to give the appearance of wanting to debate, but really don't want the challenge when it comes down to it. The challenge is to be honest, not troll, not lie, read the posts, and think before you type things that you say. This is to myself first, of course, all of it. I don't ask of others what I don't ask of myself first. There, I said it, it is messed up and unfortunate. I hope that this decision gets reconsidered, by someone that can judge fairly.Have you considered creating your own chat room? You seem to really have a need for a place where you can say what you really want to instead of thinly, and often poorly, veiling it with sarcasm. It's almost like you might want to try to make your points with bad language and insults and the HP rules just don't allow for that.
I could be wrong, of course, and if so, I apologize for misinterpreting your tone. It just seems so...combative sometimes.He and others have experienced not being able to speak up for themselves, like asking people to stop lying and trolling, or else getting mass reported and then banned. He knows that if he debates here, that will be what happens. I actually know him, and he doesn't cuss or insult like you suggest he might. The sarcasm is a style he tends to use to make his points, which is often done very well, but not maybe always pleasant for the person hearing the points in such ways.
The request to go elsewhere, when he does that, is so that he can debate without fear of getting banned, and then it happened again, and he was promoting honesty and intelligent debate. I have been having to nearly beg people to not say I said what I didn't say, and to beg them to not say they didn't say something else. It is crazy. He said that if someone said he said, "God dun it", which he has never said in his 50 years of living, they would be a lying troll, because of that and the other behavior. That was absolutely 100% true. Because of what lying means, and trolling. He was right, he can't debate fairly here. So to have the chance to do it elsewhere, would be more fair playing ground for all.
Depending on who you are, and your views and your friends, you can get away with all of that and much more, as I have observed also for 5 years now. So thank you for asking, I am sure you mean the best. I know that if anyone really read the posts in question, he would be defended, not banned. In another forum, without people that love to report when met with good arguments and being called on their dishonesty, he and the other person could have a genuine back and forth discussion. If you are in ownership of a good view, there is no need for tactics. Others can make fake accounts, and really make the forums a place where dishonesty is tolerated and encouraged, and people that are not being combative and defensive are called out as being such, and this happened to me today, it was very strange. Sometimes, people just really want to discuss views, just fairly. That is my hopeWith all due respect, ocean, a lot of people don't seem to know a personal attack from a criticism of a statement or idea or belief. Ideas, beliefs and posts are open season to criticism, and my ideas are criticized and questioned all of the time. That doesn't mean that I have the right to say "you're a stupid head liar troll" in response. Beliefs, thoughts and posts don't have feelings to be offended. People do. But offense is something that you have to choose. I choose not to be offended. Honestly, it's a waste of time from people that I literally couldn't pick out on the street for the most part, and play no part in the realities of my every day life. Why allow a stranger to have power over me to make me feel offended personally over a criticism of my thoughts, beliefs or statements? Sure, it doesn't feel good to be laughed at or questioned - but it's a learning experience, and I appreciate it when it happens, learn from it and move on.
If I were to tell you "that statement is stupid", it's a far cry from me calling YOU stupid personally. Calling someone a liar and a troll, or saying that they must be either or both in response to something else is considered a personal attack, and it's against the forum rules. I know plenty of people, atheist and believer alike that have gotten banned for it.
I personally rarely, if ever, report a post. It's rare, and I can only speak for myself. I have also been banned one time. After my first and only banning, I educated myself on the rules, and I haven't been banned since. I didn't go on a tirade on the unfairness of it all and pout that the moderators must be unfair or biased against atheists.When I've been banned, it was for arsing myself. In my experience, that's generally why it happens.
If one cannot have a civil debate without being nasty and rude, then one should expect that. I expected it when I did it, I knew I what I was doing and accepted the ban. Personal responsibility goes a long way.My hope is that in the future, more people will stand up for what is right, and not go after the people that are being lied about, and having to deal with trollish behavior. My hope is that no matter the side of the person asking the poor behavior to stop, that they will be treated fairly.
It makes me think of the post that went directly after a lady's self esteem way earlier on in this thread. She didn't deserve it. I haven't seen her post since, who would? It was just a mean thing to say, and the lady was sharing a very thoughtful post about her views of God, etc.I know for a fact that the person that went after her self esteem, didn't get banned for four weeks. You shouldn't be allowed to go after someone personally, their personal self esteem. It is much worse than calling pointing out a person is lying that is, or trolling that is.
You can find examples like this over and over, of the inconsistencies. I really think that some here couldn't care less that someone not deserving of it, got a very long ban. That isn't right. It wrecks the whole point of honest debate, to silence those that make good arguments. It makes me and others never want to come discuss and debate here. It runs off those that I would think people would really want around, IF they wanted to really test their views and be challenged on their own worldviews to test for their merits, etc.
I suppose some might be very happy they don't have to have their beliefs and ideas challenged by this person. What has happened, is one way to deal with opposing viewpoints that can't be answered in other legitimate ways. Silence the person, so they can't show how your poor points don't work or carry through. That is a win, right? Speaking in general here at this point, and most of this actually.Okay. You totally missed my entire point, but that's okay.
If people do not want to take personal responsibility for what they say and whine when they get banned for breaking the forum rules, that is their prerogative. It is highly doubtful that bans are handed down in some Grand anti Christian conspiracy. I got banned due to a personal attack. I did it, I deserved it and I moved on. I have learned to criticize statements and ideas without calling people themselves names, and I have not been banned again.
It seems that you are indignantly standing up for the "rights" of the people you agree with to call people names, without which there would be no civilized discussion, and that's the problem. Leave the name calling and personal insults on the elementary school playground and behave like an adult, regardless of who your friends are or what beliefs you hold. Everybody needs to focus on how they can better themselves, and stop looking for conspiracies against them. Stop playing the victim, develop thicker skin, just like we all have to do, and if you cannot abide by the forum's rules, then you should find another unmoderated venue and stay away from them.
You didn't even bother to look at the links did you?
Neither did I because I know the experiment well. Amino acids were formed which are the building blocks of life. And it happened really fast. Didn't take 500 years.
Next!That whole discussion was because Phoenix was asking Radman to defend his view/claim that we CAN observe things that happen over billions of years. That can't be done actually.
Actually observe? No. But reverse engineer, so to speak, maybe. The BB is exactly that. If you run it forward from the BB we can accurately describe how all the "heavenly" bodies got there and why. Also how ayoms formed and how different atoms then formed and then molecules and chemicals. It's rather amazing that it predicts all of this rather well.
We can also, for instance, plot the position of stars back as far as we want to with great accuracy. Don't know that anyone has done it for billions of years back but there is no reason we couldn't. And of course as Rad mentioned, I think: the light we see from stars is often billions of years old. So in essence we are seeing billions of years into the past.
Microwave background radiation can be observed by anyone with an old tv set tuned away from any stations. That hiss you hear is mostly from that background radiation. What you are hearing was produced billions of years ago.
But no, we can't actually see historical events as they unfolded like on a movie screen..Thanks, this helps to make the point Phoenix was making, and its really a very easy one. I hear what you are saying about things that might point to the time that has passed, but thanks for confirming we don't get to observe that time passing, and the events themselves happening.
You said billions of years can be observed. That is either a true statement or not. Did you read what he said about 500 million years? This is the point of the experiment with the terrarium in this case. To prove the point you made that 500 million years can be observed. You said it has been done.
There is an uncanny resemblance between you and Dr. Lamb and missing huge facts/points in arguments in these forums, and running off with incorrect ideas that no one suggested. I am almost certain that is it just a coincidence, and we can leave it up to people to decide if intelligence is applied or not in this case.
Yeah, he missed the boat pretty badly on that one.
- SirDentposted 11 years ago0
Don't mind me, I am just passing through. Actually, I came here for comic relief. Have a nice day.
Smart guy you are, ya gotta laugh sometime!
Have a good evening Sir Dent.
- SirDentposted 11 years ago0
I am curious about something. I just found out not long ago that Phoenix was banned. Can anyone point me to the post that got him banned? I have been trying to follow this thread but with so many posts, it is hard. I appreciate any and all help.
- Motown2Chitownposted 11 years ago0
You know, in all my time on HP, I've noticed something. Bans get longer as they get more frequent, often resulting in permanently being disallowed to participate. And with few exceptions, people who get banned inevitably blame everyone in the thread-I was bullied. I was ganged up on. They called me names. They said I'm irrational, delusional, someone reported me too many times.
First, long bans means you've had shorter ones in the past and have deliberately chosen NOT to adjust the behaviors that caused them.
Second, while I'm fairly certain HP moderators do not read every word of every post in every forum, they DO do their jobs and moderate forum discussions.
Lastly, mods don't know us from Adam at the end of the day, so WHO reports something makes not one whit of difference. If I had to bet on it, I'd bet rudeness, petty bickering, and flat out insulting posts get reported by people on any and all sides of these arguments JUST because they prefer to participate in more civil discussions.
And believe it or not, some posters have expressed very passionate and strongly worded ideas that are quite unpopular-but haven't been banned. Probably because they treat all these little pixels as though they're being read by actual human beings who deserve respect.
Just a thought.Did I ever tell you you're my hero? You're everything I wish I could be.
You seem alright. No need for everyone to get carried away though.
Haven't been carried away anywhere...lol
Still in the same place I was when I posted.
According to scientists, the world will end in 2.8 billion years when the sun will engulf the earth and other planets, becoming a red star in which the climate will be too hot to sustain any type of life. There is no need for us to worry about the world's end as we won't be here when it does.
That's a relief. I wouldn't want to have to live on this hellhole one more minute than necessary.
LOL Climate? Too hot?
We will be inside a star for goodness sake!Maybe if there are plasma-beings living on the surface of the sun, they will be happy for the extra space when our sun expands.
Or inside, for that matter! They could play ping-pong with the earth, using Jupiter as a table and solar flares providing unexpected variety to the game. Stretch the rings of Saturn across for a net, Neptune and Uranus for paddles. Comets for tickets, paid for with hydrogen to keep the sun going.
Wonder if I could get an advance on my commission? I'd accept a few tons of the worthless gold the fusion will be producing, flipped back a couple of billion years.
Don't think so, 2012 have passed, we're good now and always
On the topic of science and philosophy, my point when I bring it up has always been for people to be aware when scientists are using philosophy to explain "what the science must mean," to us as humans. It was aptly brought up, that the two don't really mix well, or ought not to mix well, being two very different disciplines. This makes the point well, that scientists should be FAIR when they insert their own held philosophy in, and TELL people they are doing that. They often ARE doing that, but almost never tell you when the science ends, and the philosophy begins.
An honest person, with an agenda for truth, whatever it might be, won't feel the need to hide the fact of their philosophy vs the science. If they say, "I am beginning to speculate now" or something like that, that is fair.Unless you want to treat extrapolation, using best evidence, etc. as "speculation" a good scientist will ALWAYS tell you when speculating. It's called "hypothesizing".
But if you're one of the ones that insist we cannot know anything we did not directly observe, you will always be in for a shock, because we can observe very little of what is considered "best evidence" to the point of being fact.I am not referring to the good scientists that do what you suggest good scientists that will always do. Extrapolating far beyond the evidence without telling you is what I am speaking of. I think there is a denial of sorts, of how much this happens actually.
I think for instance, that some people are so fed up with scientists doing this with kids of all ages, and their textbooks. On the one hand they rightly don't think the science class is the place to push a worldview or religion, and yet they are very often slipping in another worldview and philosophy which isn't science either, but suggesting it is science. Some people are saying, when it gets to the point of philosophies, don't just push your own, or maybe don't push any AS science.
While I may not be communicating what I mean, the best, I will try and continue to point out, or point out when I see this happening. That way you and others can see in examples. I think it is such a smooth move or transition, and many people trust so much, that they don't think it could ever be happening. When you get to the points of what we don't observe, like before the big bang, and whatever that could even be, we need to toss out all worldviews, and philosophy or at least entertain what other ones could best explain also. The ruling out in advance is a tactic, the ruling out of what is even allowed wouldn't be good science, but a point of view. Hijacking, is a good way of putting it, and while I don't agree a lot with Ham, this was a fair point. It ought to be considered especially by those that don't want religion or philosophy taught to their kids in science class rooms.
When you or I have been taught something as scientific fact by a science teacher, it would be normal to take it as such and NOT question them. They spent the big bucks on the big schools and did the grunt work to learn all that stuff after all, right? We seem to have an automatic trust of what they say, about everything. Then call others quacks, when they do, and we sure don't want to be quacks! So we follow along.... People are sometimes following blindly, and condemning the "other side" for things that are sometimes being done to them and their own children. Inquiring minds want to know, or should want to know if it is!
I will try to find better examples of what I mean since this idea sounds so foreign to so many. I don't know how long that will take however.You've got it, one should always question what they've been taught, religion or science. If we all questioned religion as some are being taught to question science, we'd all be in a better place.
When the question of what would it take to change your mind came up. Nye said "evidence" would change his mind. Ham said "nothing" would change his mind and that is evident in his insistence that there was a global flood 4000 years ago and every animal, insect and bird was represented on that boat that wouldn't have floated.It sounds like you pretty well confirmed what I said; any extrapolation beyond actual observation is forbidden.
At least when it's about something you don't want to hear. Our court system is based on just such action when we "prove" something no one actually observed. When your kids are fighting you do the same when you try to trace out what actually happened. When the car breaks down, the mechanic tries to figure out why, so it doesn't happen again.
But when science does it, with far more evidence that you will ever have about a kid's fight, it suddenly doesn't work. Usually because it is seen as disagreeing with sacred texts.
Your choice. We can either ignore the past, never learning what happened before our lifetime, or we can do our best to uncover the mysteries. As knowledge of those mysteries contribute heavily to our life today, I prefer the latter. We won't always get it right and will often fail in all the details (See, T-rex bit him right here as they ran down the stream bed), but we will have a far better understanding that if we pretend that people thousands of years ago, that thought the earth was the center of the universe, had all the answers - that there is nothing left to learn about the universe and where it came from.Sorry I missed this before. My response is going to focus on that last part, in case you were suggesting those ideas are something I hold. I don't like ignoring the past, or not learning what happened before my lifetime. I like to uncover mysteries as well, and don't think people expressed all the answers thousands of years ago. I too think there is much to learn about the universe, etc. The best way I can view this is that my points were not understood, and that could be my fault.
When one is presented as fact when its not, is my problem. When no "heads up" is given of the transition from fact to non fact. I think there may be a denial in general that it happens or could, and that scientists can make this mistake. I think if I am right, it explains a lot of the belief I observe in others that generally are not about belief at all,and want to stick to the facts. And they thought they were because of what they were taught. Because of the disconnect, I am going to keep my eye out for when and if I see it happening in the future, and point it out then, so people don't assume I don't care about science and the earths history (or whatever it is that is being assumed.)
Why do you say those things when they are obviously not true? Scientists are presenting facts and making predictions based on the facts, which leads to discovering, guess what... more facts.
It's very sad when you believers sit there dissing science by making up lies about it.
Consider whatever you want.
But if you want to be a Christian, you must think differently. Come on...close your mind for heaven's sake!!! lol...At least you're willing to admit you have to be closed-minded to be a Christian. I'll give you credit for that.
Now you know that is the last thing I would want! You obviously feel you need it. Who am I to deprive you of what your mind tells you?
Consider whatever you want.
But if you want to be a Christian, you must think differently. Come on...close your mind for heaven's sake!!! lol...ARMAGEDDON: This subject can form and weave many threads. Free Will, is Freedom really free? Freedom requires personal effort to do what is right and just. Evil is like a gangster who commits and murders what individuals value as good and cowardly backs away with its tail between its legs. Doing the right thing is not easy. That is one part of being free. We can debate theology however let us take it in a different direction. Let us thread it in a diverse way weaving a new cloth.
Whether there is free will or not, it is a good idea act as if we have it. To anylize our behavior and that of other people. To try to always improve our behavior, especially towards other people. I think that everyone has good and bad within them, and that we have to work to overcome our faults. Maybe evil is only doing bad things intentionally.
Very interesting, and curious what you meant by,
"We can debate theology however let us take it in a different direction. Let us thread it in a diverse way weaving a new cloth."
Yeah, believe it or not I was trying to be "brief" in the above six paragraph description, so I kind of breezed through that whole 'day 6' humans bit and wasn't very clear.
I think the 'day 6' humans are the naturally evolved humans. Homo sapiens. I think Adam was created as described, separate from these. Homo sapiens have been around for over 100,000 years, and earlier precursors for millions. As for the commands they were given, I was just pointing out how actual homo sapiens did exactly what the humans in Genesis 1 were told to do. They were fruitful and multiplied, of course, they spread all throughout the earth and adapted to its conditions, and they actually did become the dominant species in the animal kingdom.
I see pre-Adam humans behaving much like it appears in archaeological evidence and much like indigenous cultures that still exist through to this day. Tribal, small groups, hunter-gatherers. I think the introduction of Adam and Eve resulted in the humans of 'civilized' cultures. Sumer, Egypt, Greece, Rome, Syrians, Chinese, Europeans. There's a very distinct behavioral change in our human history, that happened in a very particular time and place. It's what distinguishes 'civilized' humans from 'indigenous' cultures.
For tens of thousands of years humans behaved much differently than us modern humans. They were not male-dominant, there were no differences in class, and they were very much non-violent. Much like indigenous cultures they didn't view land as a possession, but something that belonged to all living things. Ultimately, the difference between them and us is that they're content with simply living in harmony with nature. Much like the rest of the animal kingdom. They don't want for more than they have. They're not driven for more, bigger, better.
That all changed in the very same region of the world and in the very same time frame that the stories of Genesis take place. Southern Mesopotamia. Starting around 5500BC in the Ubaid culture of that region there are the first signs of social stratification. A ruling class and a working class. Soon after we see the first male-dominant cultures. The first militarized cultures, the first wars, governments, the beginning of slavery. This all happened rather quickly. And it spread rapidly. All throughout the world. That's the story our entire history tells over and over again. The larger more powerful empires expanding their boundaries, killing and enslaving the 'natives'. I think this was the result of free will. I see free will as being a more predominant ego. A stronger sense of "I" that makes the world around us seem foreign. Distances us from being connected to one another and makes even our own bodies seem apart from us. Like in the Eden story when they realized they were naked. It's a stronger self awareness. Not that indigenous people are not self- aware. They are. But they're not nearly as self-involved as we are. They're more tribe minded. Selfless.
I do believe Jesus is who he said he was and I believe the gospels are accounts of his life. The impact around Jesus' life is clearly present in history. The kinds of ripples you'd expect to see if something truly significant had happened. It transformed the world. But I do think some things could very well have been embellished along the way. Part of the reason I do what I do is to establish proper context. So I started with Genesis to first gain what I feel is a more accurate foundation that the rest of the stories are built on. Jesus doesn't come along until the end, so it's difficult to say. There were a lot of human hands in the mix at that point. All kinds of alternate versions written, other gospels not included. I do suspect the virgin birth could have been either a purposeful embellishment or maybe even a simple translation error. It could very well be the truth, but it just makes more sense to me that he be human. Not that I know anything, that's just my assessment.Did you get the idea for the pre -Adam humans from anyone? I mean in regards to the first ones not having a free will and later ones having it? If you don't want to answer anything, that is fine. What do you make of the days mentioned in Genesis during creation? What do you make of the use of "our" when God is saying in "our image?" Genesis 1:26 It speaks of the Spirit of God, and John 1, John the Baptist (not the writer, John) speaks of the one that is coming, etc, as having been there in the beginning.
Genesis 1:26 Then God said, “Let us make man[h] in our image, after our likeness. And let them have dominion over the fish of the sea and over the birds of the heavens and over the livestock and over all the earth and over every creeping thing that creeps on the earth.”
I do want to say that I appreciate the views shared and I like the way that you take a cause and effect look at what is said and compare it with what we see now and in history. If something is true, things tend to look a particular way. So it raises new questions, but might answer more. There is a book on my list of things to read called, "In the beginning, we misunderstood." It is about understanding the Genesis account with new eyes, as if through the people that lived in the days the book was written. I *think* it looks at the text through the eyes of the beliefs of the people of that day, and if written by Moses, then the predominant influences of his day. The terminology and their views of the supernatural and the moon, sun and stars, etc. I could be wrong on that.
Finally, it makes my mind go back to God and why he would insert free will at all, as he had to be first to know it could be catastrophic and it was but the risk was worth it to him evidently. You said something about freewill being the purpose, what did you mean or was that what you explained following saying that?
As for the views about cells and an organism and how things work or not for the overall health, that was very interesting too and makes sense.This is not an idea I got from someone else. It all started here ...
Gen6:1-3 - When human beings began to increase in number on the earth and daughters were born to them, 2 the sons of God saw that the daughters of humans were beautiful, and they married any of them they chose. 3 Then the Lord said, “My Spirit will not contend with humans forever, for they are mortal; their days will be a hundred and twenty years.”
These verses are arguably the most debated and least understood in all the bible. And what makes them so mysterious is the traditional notion that Adam was the first human ever. There are a few things in pre-flood Genesis that are really vague and confusing in the traditional view. The others Cain feared would harm him when he was banished, for one. Whoever wounded Lamech, Cain's descendant, at the end of Genesis 4. And then there's that above bit. It's clearly talking about two factions, one being mortal, the other not. Many think the 'sons of God' are angels, though this isn't consistent with every other mention of the 'sons of God' throughout the rest of the texts.
I always knew humanity started in Africa, and not Mesopotamia. But I never dismissed these stories as metaphor either because others, including Jesus, referred to Adam and Noah as if they were real. And the stories talk about specific places and give specific ages and such. I just didn't know how it all fit together. Then I read that above passage for about the 500th time and all of the sudden it clicked. This comes just one chapter after explaining that Adam and his descendants lived for centuries, yet here it says humans are 'mortal' and only live 120 years. It also didn't make sense to me that angels would have free will or that they'd be capable of mating/procreating. But Adam's descendants were capable of both. Once I re-read the story in that light it all made way more sense.
When I then began to look for these events in actual history, once I knew they weren't talking about the beginning of humanity, but rather took place in an already populated world, then I was able to find an actual stretch of time where events much like what's described really did happen in the same time frame given. I used the ages given to construct a framework of events and simply laid them over history. Not only do I see events that line up, but the impact of those events if they really did happen can be seen as well. An actual flood that actually did abruptly end a nearly 2000 year old culture. The same flood the Sumerians talked about as well. There actually was a city built much like the one Genesis 4 says Cain built. There actually was a mass dispersion of humans due to a climate change called the 5.9 kiloyear event that closely matches the Babel story. And most significantly, the changes that happened to Adam and Eve, like Eve being under Adam's thumb, can really be seen as well as we see the first signs of male-dominate societies in this time frame. And we see them spread after that climate event spread everybody out. It's right after that when multiple civilizations popped up in the region, first in Sumer, then to the west in Egypt about a century later, then in the Indus Valley to the west about a century later, then in Akkad to the north. Each with their own unique language.
As for the 'days' during creation, I wrote a hub that matches up all of creation with actual history that you can check out. It's called "God Created Evolution: The Genesis Creation Account is Scientifically Accurate". Personally, as far as the 'let us make man in our image' thing, I think that just has to do with this story being recited by humans. They were referring to themselves. I don't think it's a direct quote from God. It's a human story, written by humans. But it does have information humans couldn't have known. So I think it's just a case of God actually interacting with Adam, Eve, Cain, Enoch, etc. These people could have heard about events through that interaction, then told it in a story in terms they understand. I'm always open to other people's take and I'm always open to my own being wrong.
As for free will, I think about it like this. If you were a God capable of creating existence, you'd basically have three choices; no existence, existence where everyone and everything behaves exactly according to your will, or existence with beings with the own minds and their own wills. Free will means who we love and who we spend our time with, it's a choice and not something we're just 'naturally predisposed' to do. If we choose to do something good, to be kind, then it's an actual choice and again not something we just 'naturally' do. There would be no point, from God's perspective, to even create existence without it. Because it would all only behave one way, everything would only play out one way, so there'd be no point in actually making it. Free will gives existence purpose and meaning. It means existence is an environment specifically created to create free will. To give us the chance to experience existing with our own minds and wills, and give us the opportunity to choose to be with God willfully.Thanks for the answers to the many questions. I for one appreciate the method and time spent on sharing these ideas. They make sense, without having the added feel of just trying to support a held view or something taught previously for the sake of it. Many people defend views that I think sometimes don't have really good reasons for defending them. I imagine you get many different responses to this kind of stuff, but I hope you continue to write about it all. There is a lot of information and I am not sure what to think about it all, but most of it makes a lot of sense. I do have some questions, and appreciate the sharing of the hub ideas. Even if we disagree, I imagine I can respect how you came to your decisions from what I have seen so far.
My biggest difference so far is that I think Jesus did many things that a mere human could not do, and showed he had qualities that were the kind that his Father had. To be able to forgive, prophecy, have power over nature and the spiritual realm and death were some of the biggies, besides perfection morally and the teaching with authority after being raised in Nazareth by a carpenter,etc. Even with all of that, I take it all at face value, and have people already that disagree with what I have been taught in the past about the Godhead, etc.
I truly believe that whatever is true and real, will line up with the same, and I think that is God, but don't go about it with a set way of thinking necessarily or believing. I challenge my own beliefs hardest, thanks to the many arguments proposed by atheists beginning many years ago. I figured my own views don't get a free ride any more than anyone else. So thanks for sharing it all, I really appreciate that and hope you didn't take my questions as being a hard line of questioning or anything. Was just curious and those are the initial things that came to mind.I appreciate the questions. I discuss these things with others to test myself and my ideas. I want my ideas questioned, challenged and argued against.
Also, to be clear where Jesus is concerned, seeing him as human does not mean I don't think he was capable of what the stories say. Much in the same way Moses was given capabilities to demonstrate God's power when he spoke to the Egyptian Pharaoh on God's behalf, I think the same is true for Jesus. Because Jesus led the life he did he was a good representative of God. In the context as I understand it he was created by God specifically through centuries of interactions with the Israelites. So it's in that way that I think he was conceived by God.
In Genesis 6, when the 'sons of God' began intermingling with humans, it says God's 'spirit' would not contend with humans forever. All throughout the rest of the story the Israelites, the numerous promised descendants of Abraham, are given these very specific rules about who they can and can't breed with that only apply to them. Then, in Ezra 9 I think it is, it talks about not diluting the 'holy seed'. Throughout the old testament it is the Israelites who are referred to as God's 'sons'. In Luke 3 it refers to everyone from Adam to Noah to Abraham to David to Jesus as 'sons of God'. But then, after Jesus' death/resurrection it then begins to speak of the holy spirit and talks about how now gentiles who simply believe in Jesus are included as 'sons of God' ...
John 1:12 - But as many as received Him, to them gave He power to become the sons of God, even to those who believe in His name
Romans 8:14 - For as many as are led by the Spirit of God, they are the sons of God.
1 John 3:1 - Behold what manner of love the Father hath bestowed upon us, that we should be called the sons of God! Therefore the world knoweth us not, because it knew Him not.
So whatever was first given to Adam through God breathing the breath of life into him was protected and kept alive through those interactions with the Israelites until Jesus was finally born. Once he was crucified and resurrected God's 'spirit' was then available to all. It's at that point that the direct interactions stop and God steps back. I think this is because He accomplished what all of those interactions that came before were meant to do. That's why I think Paul said that Jesus was the 'last Adam'. He fulfilled what Adam, and everyone since, could not.Some initial questions/thoughts....
Who then biologically fathered Jesus?
So you basically consider Jesus like a prophet that did a good job morally in his life, to quality to be a perfect sacrifice?
Why would Elizabeth, say to Mary, "The mother of my Lord?" When they were both pregnant with John the Baptist and Jesus?
I know it sounds like I am pushing for the "God" side of Jesus, but I actually not for this exercise. Even if not God, there is a very strong sense about Jesus that sets him head and shoulders way above the best of the best prophets there ever were. No other prophet instituted something like communion, or knew all the secrets of the kingdom and power of God like Jesus, again compare it to the other prophets, even Elijah. He raised a boy from the dead, but compare that but then predicting his own death (referring to his body as the temple that would be raised in three days...), and then coming back to life and going up into the clouds later saying he will come back again. Nothing like the big stuff with the other prophets, in my opinion. Everything after was about his message, and the apostles died for that message, but not for any other prophet's message. I just sense a bit of a red flag that makes me feel a tiny bit like he is being diminished somehow, if i am totally honest. So that doesn't sit right.
As a child he was very wise, as an adult his own mother had to encourage him into public ministry with the wedding in Cana and the wine, etc. I maybe agree in the sense that the Old Testament was pointing all along towards Jesus. I don't know why the need for such embellishment as a virgin birth when the other could be equally communicated and him be a very special new prophet of his day, etc. The preparing the way for him, by John the baptist, we see nothing like this. We see him accept worship, as if...... We see him forgive... but only one can. To the point you can see the Jews saw him like no other prophet, and he was the worst guy for the "sacrilege", and more. Trying to think who directly had interaction with Satan and temptation to the degree he did, but then that could go to your point about the New Adam, but I didn't disagree he was the second Adam. I just didn't take it to mean just a man like Adam.
Hmmmm, I don't know. I think I have studied the NT more than the old, admittedly, but have studied the OT. Those prophets that did the big stuff, did it on occasion, and didn't seem to BE as much of an authority as Jesus. The disciples eventually could do stuff, but they couldn't at first, and never quite like Jesus. He exhibited knowledge of what was IN people's minds, the woman at the well, and Zaccheus the tax collector, and where he was hiding. The power he felt leave his body when the woman touched him. You get the idea, I hope, of where i am coming from. I don't see the benefit (not that that would be your goal, but could be in part) of changing up THIS part of the whole revelation of God to people. I am not having an attitude either, lol, if it seems like it, just tired. This is very interesting stuff though.
One last thing, at best, is Jesus' birth scandalous, because he wasn't Joseph's baby. He didn't have relations with Mary until after the baby was born. Let me know if you think that and many other things are not as they are stated in the NT, to support your view too, as I am curious about that. A lot would have to not be as it is shown to be there, as far as I can see. I feel the need for caution with this stuff, call me strange, lol.First off, I should qualify this by saying this is just an idea I consider based on how I read the OT set in the context of actual history. I'm leery of people and their motivations and there were a lot of human hands in the mix where the gospels are concerned. There's debate whether or not the prophecy of the 'virgin birth' in Isaiah 7:14 actually says 'virgin', or if the word used actually just means 'young woman'. The parts in the gospels that speak specifically about the virgin birth and the angel appearing to Joseph who was considering divorcing her just seem kind of tacked on to the rest of it. Most of the gospels are said to be accounts of these men and their time with Jesus, so the bits that talk about Jesus' conception and birth at best could only be oral stories they heard later. Maybe that's just my cynicism getting the best of me, but I don't put it past early scribes to try to embellish the story in those early years when the church was first coming into power.
I think it's significant that both Mary and Joseph come from the same line, from David. It could very well have been a virgin birth as I do not doubt God's capability, but it just seems to me what was most significant about Jesus is that he was born of the flesh. He was human like everyone else, with the same temptations and weaknesses. Only he did not succumb. I do think he was far more than just another prophet. I think he was God's son in the sense that God specifically made him. And I think he was made to be a suitable host for God's spirit. In the same way Adam and Eve were severed from God with the fall, having never severed his tie with God through sin, I see it as God's spirit being uninhibited by Jesus' own will. I just wonder if the traditional idea that all of humanity came from Adam somehow made it seem warranted to set Jesus apart in this way. Where in the context of Adam being created by God separate from the rest of humanity, if God's 'spirit' that was said would not 'contend with humans forever' (Gen6:3) once they started intermingling was preserved in this bloodline through such strict control, this in itself would set him apart. Because the spirit given to Adam was preserved in all of those referred to as 'God's sons'.
So this idea, whether true or not, in my mind doesn't take away from Jesus and all he did. I just see this as Jesus' own will not impeding God's spirit so that he could be an accurate reflection of God and God's will. Something no other human was capable of. I know this can be a troubling idea to kick around for many Christians. I don't mean it to be controversial and I don't mean it to sound as if I'm meaning to diminish Jesus in any way. I am still a Christian because I do see Jesus as being significant as I believe he is indeed our savior. None of this changes that as I see it. This is just part of my attempt to get to the essence of the story and to find what's truth and what isn't. My assessment of the Genesis account doesn't hinge on this idea. This is just something that raised my interest that I consider in the context of the story as I read it. It's something I consider in my critical assessment of all the 'givens' of traditional religion. I feel that what's true will hold up to scrutiny, and I want to ensure I'm not just accepting something off-hand when deeper insights may be available through further consideration.At the risk of being a total thorn in your side, lol, I will move forward with this conversation if you don't mind. If at any time you need or want to bow out that is understandable. Since you said you welcome questions and scrutiny, I am here to give it so hope you meant that. At any rate....
As for any history, we always have something to base it off of, but the OT is one great example of history, must of it is anyway. I believe it is the actual history of the Israelites, from their point of view. Their ups and lots of downs. They are even brutally honest at times about how awful they got and how God responded, etc. You said you view it in the context of "actual history", and maybe misunderstood that. That isn't even one of the bigger points though, so moving on.
I have to say that you don't seem conventional or really orthodox in any sense of the word, bucking a LOT of the typical Christian ways of thinking and believing and understanding. I am not judging you for this, just observing and I mean things like the term, "inerrant word of God," for instance. That is taught, and you don't seem to take the bible as the revealed word of God like many Christians I know, and I know a lot of different kinds over the course of my life. I didn't think I was a typical Christian either, but wow. The reason for possible surprise from me, is that I agree with you on so many of the things you have said and appreciate your approach, that I am almost disappointed at some of the points I might differ at this point. I mean that as a compliment as I wanted to agree with you on everything. I am impressed you invite more thoughtful discussion on the topics though, to test things.
For as much as I have in common with you (from what I can see so far), I have some things that don't really seem to work for a couple of reasons. Its hard to even know where to jump back in, because of this feeling of almost collisions in the mind I am having reading some of the stuff. I am a hard tester of my own faith, and believe also that the truth can stand well on its own with, with no help. This is why I take this stuff you are saying as very serious.
As for feeling leery of people, get in line, I hear that! However, the way the bible came to us is not supposed to be dependent on man's perfection, but in spite of. So this is where the conventional stuff flies out the door. I observe you don't take the bible to be inspired of God, and very possibly full of mistakes or allowed to be transcribed in a manner that some how falls out of God's will and thus hand being on the whole endeavor. (It could BE wrong, but I am speaking of orthodoxy here...) Please understand, I am first to be against some of the early church hijacking of the words of Jesus and the apostles, for their own ends. That is a whole other topic, but the question it raises is can God fail in this regard, when it comes to him revealing himself to us. I have to end this here at this point, and will start again later. That is probably plenty for now anyway. Just so I am clear, you hold to nothing but science as the main revealing of God to mankind, and then see what else lines up with that, correct? When in doubt, the science stands and the rest of revelation outside of nature if connected to humanity, takes a back seat, right?You are certainly not a thorn. I enjoy having the conversation and getting other people's insights. My only problem is finding the time. I encourage you to challenge what I say and under no circumstances do I want you to take my word for any of it without verifying it for yourself. I could be completely off-base. All I can do is be as honest as I know how to be about what I believe and why I believe it. I think it's an important conversation that needs to be had.
I guess it's not really correct for me to say "actual history", as the bible itself is an historical document. What I mean by "actual" is the standard model of both the earth's history and human history as pieced together through science. It's the most accurate picture available, and the least obscured by human influence, of what happened and when. The human element is fallible, so I remove as much of it from the equation as possible, and just stand the bible itself side by side against our modern view of history.
But I'm not under the delusion that the bible is the inerrant word of God. For one thing that would not be consistent with my views on free will, as being the inerrant word would basically require that God write through someone. But I do think the bible is exactly what it needs to be. I don't think it needs to be demonstrable perfection, as that would basically be objective proof of God which would undermine faith, but it has certainly had a significant impact on a great many people who have found comfort and guidance and hope through it. I know powerful groups played a role in the bible being such a prevalent part of our past, but even still, something doesn't have the kind of staying power it's had if it doesn't really mean something to a great deal of people through the ages.
I think the best example I can give of human error in the bible is the duplicated wife-sister stories in Genesis 11, 20, and 26. The basic jist of the story is that a man and his wife enter the lands of a powerful king. The man decides to tell the locals that his beautiful wife is his sister so that king, who will inevitably want this beautiful woman for himself, won't have the man killed. Then the king is cursed by God for sleeping with this married woman, so the king sends the man off with riches and tells him to leave. Same basic story, only in Genesis 11 the married couple is Abraham and Sarah and the king is the pharaoh of Egypt. In Genesis 20 it's Abraham and Sarah again, but this time it's king Abimelech. And in chapter 26 it's king Abhimelek again! Only this time instead of Abraham and Sarah it's Isaac and Rebekah.... http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wife%E2%80 … of_Genesis
However, it's important to understand the anatomy of the text. The book of Genesis was pieced together from multiple sources. The story of Adam/Eve, Cain/Abel, Noah, through to the Babel story, Gen2-11, is one long story taken from at least two sources so similar that they were basically just edited together. The line of descendants in Genesis 5 and 10 were later edited into the story, probably to explain who Noah was when the story jumps from Cain to Noah, and then again to say who's who of Noah's descendants. Nobody knows how old these source texts are or who wrote them. We only know they exist by examining the oldest surviving copies of the Septuagint. But these stories are echoed in Sumerian mythology as well, which is the civilization that sprang up from southern Mesopotamia. Chances are these stories are quite old and very well known throughout the region. But the chapters after that, primarily those that deal with Abraham and Lot and Isaac, these stories are one-offs, pieced together chronologically. The duplicated stories above are part of these. I think this story may have happened once, in some form, and the story that survives morphed over time. In one version it's Abraham, later Isaac... http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Documentary_hypothesis
But, ultimately, according to the Adam/Eve through Noah and Babel story, God introduced free will and then made modifications along the way to account for the impact of this action. First through a flood, then again at Babel. Beyond that it is very much the history of the Israelites from their perspective, which as you pointed out is a back and forth illustrating the Israelites as often being at odds with God's will. So, while free will is a will apart from God's and therefore not entirely under His control, by design, God is also master of time and space. Being capable of seeing all time all at once He can ensure whatever desired outcome as He sees fit by making those kinds of adjustments where necessary. So, ultimately, while I think the bible is a product of human hands, I think it accomplishes exactly what it's meant to and is exactly what it needs to be.Thank you for that. Will be jumping around here, lol. Ok, one of the problems that arises if these views are true, is human sacrifice, which the bible is against, (when they found out about the one group that was sacrificing infants to their gods). If not the way I thought the text reads, then its not so much God's own sacrifice, but just human sacrifice.
On the other hand, one thing it helps is the idea of a Messiah for the Jews. They have always said that a "demi-god" couldn't do the trick, (but also are against human sacrifice...) but that Jesus couldn't be him according to the Christian tradition because he was God, or half God, depending on how they looked at it. With these views, the problem of Jesus being just human could get him "back in the running" legitimately perhaps, with them on that count.
I understand about the time issue, if only there was more of that precious commodity. As for taking people's words for things, I don't, so that is all good.
Do you not think God could deliver, through particular people, his word without error? If so you mentioned free will would couldn't be the case, but I wonder how that is? How does that negate free will? I guess it also doesn't have to be perfect, BUT, it can't lead people astray or give them lies....
As for the error you mentioned about the wife sister stories, you don't think anything else could explain that? I mean, the suggestion then is that both the writers and the scribes didn't catch a mistake that we so clearly could, and ought to have been doing a better job at their "cover up." It does seem kind of strange of course, admittedly. I am just saying, is it so different than the gospels and how they show an event from different points of view, that some like to use to discredit the gospel story with all the "contradictions?"
As for the stories around and before the flood, I have heard it said that it makes complete sense (and I agree) that you would have multiple stories from multiple people about such a flood if there were indeed such a flood. Many people groups have a flood story, and I don't know that it should be used to discount the bible, if it is. Would need more support or explanation where I am misunderstanding perhaps.
Another question, what percentage of the bible would you say is "accurate", if that isn't too pointed of a question, or if you feel on the spot. I can't get a feel for that, and the range I sense goes from not that much, to a huge amount, might not be accurate in your opinion. Just curious there.
Think about how much you seem to esteem being a well thought out person, and you are finding these things out, and sharing them which I think is good. Now think of the average Joe, that isn't nearly as well thought out, and looking to the word of God for hope. Is it a lost cause for that guy, because he can't know what is true and false, and needs to read so much between the lines? I can't help but think that would have to be the case. Again, I feel like I might be sounding harsh but I don't mean to be. I can't imagine God would allow for so much to be "off" or so much so easily misunderstood, that it takes so long for someone of general intelligence to get God's message. I mean it COULD be the case, I don't know.... Just thinking "out loud", lol, or with my fingers I guess....
What kind of "adjustments as necessary" did you mean, by God, toward the end? That may have answered some of the above... Perhaps its one for one and one for another, and fitting for all.. (shrugs shoulders.... ) Just thinking it over.I'll try to be brief (haha). We'll see how it goes, but there's a lot to cover here. First, as for the duplicated wife-sister stories, I think it's just a matter of including all the relevant stories chronologically to best convey the overall story. I don't think it's a matter of the redactors of Genesis not realizing the duplication, I think it's more a matter of including all the available/relevant stories in the overall text, but maybe not knowing for sure what all is what. The stories are arranged chronologically with the rest because Abraham is still 'Abram' in the first one, 'Abraham' in the second, and then of course the third one is Isaac. But I do not think it's full of lies. I think it's just a collection of historical stories told from a human point of view, inspired by God and events that involve God. I think it was written and edited by human hands, but still ensured to be exactly what it needs to be through God's influence. I think if the bible were objectively perfect then it would undermine the whole concept of faith.
As for the "average Joe", I don't think understanding all of the stuff I'm speaking of, if true, is a requirement. Like it says in Proverbs 3:5, "Trust in the Lord with all your heart and lean not on your own understanding." Simply trusting God and having faith is all you need, and the bible can be a guide in that along with prayer. But in this material/science age, when people are calling into question this whole God concept, the lack of a cohesive understandable concept leads many to see the whole story as man-made myth. I don't think it's impossible to understand, especially in this modern age, but it's going to be an elaborate story because reality is elaborate. Though the story I think it tells is actually a rather simple one. What makes it so difficult is the fact that it's built around such a familiar story that nearly everyone already has preconceived ideas about. It's hard to separate those preconceived ideas from the text itself, so it can sometimes be difficult to see it in a different light than one is accustomed to.
As far as addressing the rest of this, the best approach I think is laying out the story as I read it. Basically I think those early Genesis stories are describing how the world of humanity was first set in motion. It's a depiction of the events surrounding God's introduction of free will into the world.
It begins by explaining how all of creation conformed exactly to God's will to the point He deemed it all 'good'. All the natural world, animate or inanimate, accomplished God's will exactly. Chapter two then explains that God created a particular individual who was capable of acting according to his own will. The first thing God does is He brings animals to Adam to 'see what he'll call them'. Just something as simple as giving something a name is Adam creating something that is not 'of God', but 'of Adam'. Free will makes us creators, in a sense. The environment Adam/Eve are placed in is the perfect environment to test them. There's just one rule, a law set by the creator. And they showed in chapter three that they were capable of behaving contrary to God's specific rule, which resulted in some very specific consequences. Chapter four then gives us our first sense of there being more going on when Cain talks about fearing the 'others' he might encounter after being banished. Then, though traditionally he's just the second generation of human ever, it says he built a city. It then goes on to talk about six generations of Cain's family, inexplicably it would seem as they all, presumably, died in the flood. Yet it talks about his descendants 'fathering' all those who play stringed instruments and such. Then, before Gen5 was shoe-horned in there, the story goes right to those odd lines at the beginning of Gen6. "When human beings began to increase in number...". I don't think this means in all the world, but rather in the region they lived in, probably because there was a burgeoning city.
I always found it interesting in the beginning of Gen6 that it says God "regretted" putting humans on the earth. It seemed odd to me that an omnipotent God would 'regret' anything. How could that be? But in this context that actually makes a lot of sense. Everyone 'of Eve' on the earth during that time behaved according to their own will. And through their own will, because it says they found the 'daughters of humans' beautiful, they began to marry and have children with them. It's here that it says humanity became 'wicked'. This makes sense if their off-spring were capable of free will as well. In naturally evolved humans not made by hand by God as Adam was free will quickly led to adverse affects. Enough to warrant a flood. But God saw favorable traits in Noah, so He decided to continue to breed from him. In the Babel story it then says God came down to see what the 'children of men' were building. Working together, with free will, they were showing themselves to be rather inventive and capable through their building of a city and a tower. So, because of what He observed, God decided to confuse their languages and disperse them. This again seems to be an adjustment God made based on what free willed beings were doing.
In the history of that region there really was a flood around 4000BC that abruptly ended a 2000 year old culture. About a century later, 3900BC, there was a climate change that transformed the Sahara from green lands back to desert. This caused a mass dispersion of the humans in that region towards the lands along river banks, like the Tigris/Euphrates and the Nile. And it's in the centuries immediately following this that multiple civilizations sprang up in Sumer, Egypt, India, Europe, etc. Each with their own language. So, each of these places started with the dispersed descendants of Noah, each with a faint memory of a flood in their ancient past. This is why I think there's such commonality in the flood story all around the world. Not because the flood was global, but because the ancestors of the all the 'civilized' cultures to follow were all in once place when a regional flood happened.
Now, think about this in the context of what's described in Genesis literally happened. If beings like Adam and his hundreds of descendants were really created in a region already populated by humans. Intelligent beings who built cities and lived for centuries as opposed to humans who only live 'mortal' lives. If that really happened, what would you expect to see? If these long-living descendants were spread all over an already populated world, what should we expect to see? What we do see are some significant advances forward in technology and craftsmanship, the emergence of the first civilizations, we see significant differences in human behavior and the emergence of ruling and working classes within these cultures, and we also see numerous mythological stories where each of these civilizations tell very similar stories about these immortal long-living gods, male and female, who were moody and unpredictable, and who lived among them in their ancient past, and who interacted with them and even mated and had children by them. What if the commonality in themes between these stories is because they're all referring to the same events that really happened? What if, instead of mythological stories being ignorant bronze age people trying to make sense out of a natural world they didn't understand, these stories are actually inspired by actual beings who actually did exist in our ancient past a thousand or more years before writing?
I hope that addresses all of your questions. Or at least gives a better sense of the overall concept that might in itself answer your questions. Just let me know. I don't know how quickly I'll be able to respond, but I'll keep an eye out and will gladly keep replying as long as you can stand it.Jumping right in....
Maybe I missed the point then about the sister-wife stories, that I thought you were saying were in error, but it seems like now you are saying it was just the way they were putting it in chronologically, etc. I think I missed the point, because in the end we did agree on what was probably happening there. I think its a good thing if they include all the available and relevant stories in the overall text, to make sure to cover everything. I also think its a collection of historical stories told from a human point of view, but that God orchestrated it getting put down and saved for all of us for all time up until now. Which would make sense if God wanted us to know this stuff. So what started as points at odds, seems to now be the case, but I am not sure what happened there.
As for the average Joe comments, I wasn't saying that others would need to believe as you do for a requirement....... I guess I am not best at expressing my points, and I am short on time really a lot lately.
Interesting about the idea of free will making us creators, in a sense. I am assuming you mean how mankind can come up with something on their own, no matter what it is, and we see the cause and effect of that.
I have always wondered about the others that Cain was afraid of, etc. That God seems to acknowledge also.
Can you rephrase how God "regretted" makes more sense in this context? I was about to get the point but lost it somehow. Which part do you think he actually regretted?
Can you give some examples of some of the possible similar myths that you think could be real in this context? You mention moody and unpredictable, and I wonder who in particular you are referring to.
This does help some conceptually, though questions abound, but I can't think of them all right now. I do appreciate the ideas, and certainly nothing can be hurt for the considering of the past and different people groups histories.... It makes me think of going to the art museum, and different places. All the depictions and ancient things excavated that sheds a little light into the different people groups.
I wonder how long God will wait until the next time. If nothing else, he is very patient.My point about the wife-sister narratives is that I don't think the same thing happened three different times, twice to the same king. In the context of the story Abraham's time would have been before the Israelites spent centuries living in Egypt as slaves. It says Moses lived 400 years after Abraham. So you can maybe imagine these stories of Abraham and Isaac and Jacob might be obscured or distorted over time. So I think it's just a matter of including all the written versions of these age-old stories.
Regarding free will making us creators, in the Babel story it says God came down to see the city and tower the 'children of men' were building, and says, "... nothing they plan to do will be impossible for them." So he confuses their languages and scatters them. It's then that the same things started happening, cities were being built, only in multiple places by cultures with different languages. I think the reason we're capable of evil is because we're creators. We can create things not 'of God', so we can create evil. Not everything we do is evil, but we have the potential.
In the stories of the Isrealites people often take issue with the kinds of things it speaks of. God ordering the Israelites to take land by force, to kill every woman and child, to take slaves. This is often seen to be in contrast with the God of love of the new testament. I don't think this was some ideal way of life as God intended it to be. I think these were the things necessary to survive in the world created by free will. That age in our history when the first civilizations came about, is arguably the most violent in all of history. In that age you were either the ones in power by might, or you survived as slaves of those in power. Much like the stories depict, being out in the open was dangerous. Lawless. The Israelites cried out about their situation in Egypt, and God heard those cries and sent Moses. In that age, if you are no longer under the protection of the Egyptians, and you need to maintain your population of tens/hundreds of thousands, these are the things you had to do to survive. This is the world free will created.
As for God's 'regret', it says he regretted putting humans on the earth. He had made them in His image, and presumably in the image/likeness of Adam and Eve. Adam and Eve's free willed descendants, began marrying and having children with humans, introducing free will into homo sapiens, us. This is when it said humans became 'wicked'. This is why I think it says God regretted putting humans on the earth. Something unintended happened. They bred with humans, introducing free will, resulting in 'wickedness', and warranting a flood.
If you look at the mythology of the different cultures, you'll find many of them of that same region are very similar. The most well known are the Greek and Roman gods. Male and female, often squaring off against one another, intermingling with humans creating demi-gods. The Sumerians also have stories of very similar gods. Immortal gods who lived among them. Even taught them civilization. According to the descendants of the Sumerians, the inventors of civilization, they didn't give credit to their ancestors. They say they were taught. In the Sumerian stories there is a flood, with people living extremely long ages before the flood, then lifespans sharply decreasing after. They also talk about one who survived this flood by building a boat and bringing with him animals and a handful of people. They also have a story about a once universal language that was confused into many.
It's Sumer where those human behavioral changes first started, and they spread from there. Many of these civilizations speak of a golden age before humans became 'wicked'. Before this behavioral change humans lived much like indigenous cultures still do to this day. Like Aborigines and native Americans and tribes south of the Sahara in Africa. They didn't treat land like a possession, but something that belonged to all living things. They lived in harmony with nature. There was no social hierarchy within tribes. All were equal, including men and women. According to the Sumerian stories, along with the 'gifts of civilization' (called 'mes'), the Sumerian gods also gave them the capability to be deceitful, to do 'bad' things.... http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Me_%28mythology%29
I think it's very telling how the Roman poet Ovid put it in speaking of this change in humanity ...
"There broke out ... all manner of evil, and shame fled, and truth and faith. In place of these came deceits and trickery and treachery and force and the accursed love of possession ... And the land, hitherto a common possession like the light of the sun and the breezes, the careful surveyor now marked out with long boundary lines."I think some of what my seeming confusion is due to my misunderstanding a point, and the sister wife explanation you gave last I totally get that too. I guess you are just saying in part, it very obviously isn't word for word the inerrant word of God, which if that is the case, I already agreed that there are issues like that. Sometimes what seemed like odds turns out to not really be.
Or, there might have been some confusion before when talking about the people God created, then the people with free will and then you said they bred with the humans, and I got confused, and didn't really characterize that there correctly even. But you get the idea. There really wasn't as much confusion perhaps and disconnect as I thought. I am not far from these ideas at all, and appreciate the insight into how you carry these ideas over to make sense of the greater history of man and the world, etc.
I have always spoken of the ancient tribes of Israel in the way you described there, or a form of that. It makes sense, and it stinks that it was kill or be killed, or be a good slave for a time, etc. What you said about the other gods and myths was what I was thinking. I tend to ask a lot of questions of lots of people, to be clear of their views and points, and it helps to avoid other problems in discussions later sometimes to not assume. So while not all questions are answered to the "nth" degree, nor could they possibly be, I do get a greater feel I think of the points you were trying to convey than before. I perhaps will spare some the massive posts, and concentrate on smaller particulars in the future if and when I see them, for there is just so much here, and the ramifications of it all, etc.
One of the ironies, is that what was/is a supposed detractors to the idea of God and his part in humanity, turns out to be just another explanation. Like the many accounts, that Christianity supposedly stole the ideas and made them their own, etc. Thanks for sharing, and I hope you always share these things, and hope even more that people won't close their minds to possible truths, even when uncomfortable."In the stories of the Isrealites people often take issue with the kinds of things it speaks of. God ordering the Israelites to take land by force, to kill every woman and child, to take slaves. This is often seen to be in contrast with the God of love of the new testament. I don't think this was some ideal way of life as God intended it to be. "
Some dumb god you have if he didn't see that coming. Omnipotent and all knowing you say in one breath and then in the other he regrets things, he has to get humans to do his dirty work for him, it sounds like he's a real screw up. Didn't even manage to wipe out evil by drowning us all and starting over. Seems like he fails at everything he does.
Just an aside: We keep calling him he, but does he have a penis and what would he use it for if he did? If not you can't call him he.can you?
The Hebrews stole the myths from the Sumerians, that is clear. The Sumerians were a culture long before the Hebrews came out of the woods. Why you think the Hebrews actually came up with any of this is beyond me. They obviously copied everything and twisted it over time.I think the fact that He created an entire universe to then create free will within it means He realized just how volatile an element this would be. I think the fact that he chose the Mesopotamian valley, which is the geological equivalent of a storm drain, as the location to first introduce this capability means He realized. If free will is a will independent of His, then, by design, there would be actions and outcomes not 'of Him', but 'of us'. Of course, being omnipotent, He'd immediately know as soon as free will was introduced. It's not like He had to wait and see what would happen.
You can call it dumb if you like, but as far as I can tell God went through a whole lot of trouble just to make sure you would be capable of this kind of criticism.A whole lot of trouble. Yes the entire universe and almost 14 billion years, just to make us and allow us to think freely. He's hiding himself so we have a choice, so much for full disclosure. He purposely makes a universe with zero evidence of himself to deceive us.
It's almost like it's all made up by humans to explain why we can't find evidence of him. Of course the old books tell us that prayer moves mountains, but now we find out that he isn't answering prayers because he would rather deceive us by hiding himself so that we can choose him of our own free will. So much for full disclosure. Rather dishonest if you ask me.Yes, and I think that is purposeful, as I am sure you do. Good way of putting it though, lol. A perfect combo, not forcing himself, allowing for time to mull things over, and also not hiding himself.
The "effect" we see, is meant to point to the cause. Plain and simple. The possible mental games we play with ourselves in the mean time are our own, to own. I say this to myself first. Its not a pleasant conclusion to so many, vs.the idea we are pretty much in charge of our own lives and answer only to ourselves. Yet we cannot begin to account for our own being here, nor can our parents or theirs. We are walking miracles pondering our own existences, and some think that it makes the most sense that "yeah, that just happens" in universes, and is able to be done by naturalism, or material means.
Its OK to hold on to the lesser of logical options for whatever the reasons are, but at the end of the day, the same people that hold that view are still holding on to the lesser of logical options for the explanation of all we see. We really ought to stop holding on to views that don't satisfy the requirements, any of us that do. Speaking in general here, and guess I went off on a tangent, lol.Again, and I'm sorry but I've got to point out how arrogant that sounds. "walking miracles". tI should be pointed out that all life is fantastic and to just point to us and to claim that the only way we could be here is because it was intended as we are so fantastic we could not have evolved with the ability to be aware is arrogant at the very least. It can be pointed out that we are not the only self aware creatures on this very planet and evolution is not yet done, until life is done and on earth that may be about 2 billion years.
I had said that we are walking miracles, able to ponder our own existence, and you responded there to that. I wanted to share that I am not the only "arrogant" one that thinks that, many others do, that you may have more respect for than me. Dr. Jill Bolte Taylor, (who thanks to A Thousand Words, I now know about, thank you for the link to her story in another post!). Anyway, she was chosen by Time magazine back in 2008 as one of the worlds 100 most influential people. Here is a link to a video where in the early part of it, she speaks of our bodies, like a miracle also. I just found it interesting, and even if we have different views, (not sure on that fully yet, but I have an idea), she does think our lives are precious, and a miracle of sorts.
http://youtu.be/tiHRPmxAQSgYou've got my full respect and I'm not calling you specifically arrogant, but the idea that we are special and or walking miracles and or the entire universe was created for us is arrogant.
I'd like to kindly remind you that it was never me that says the entire universe was created for us, but you have said it several times now. I think its one of your beliefs about Christians maybe? So you assume its true for them all? I mean I have never said that once. You can't just slip that in there and then make it part of what you are arguing against lol.
Perhaps then that's because you keep your views hidden. If you believe the bible and are Christian, Jew or Muslim then you are following the OT's account of creation which on many occasions states it's purpose, if you feel different then I'd like to here it rather than you simply saying you think different.
So when I ask why he is undetectable and doesn't statistically answer prayers I'm told it's because he doesn't want to take away our free will and then when I show that not showing himself is taking away our free will to choose, I'm told he is in plain sight?
Dishonest? There's a whole book detailing exactly what He did. You clearly know all about Him. As for prayer, He's directly answered quite a few of mine. As for zero evidence, just look at the post above. There's plenty of evidence if you know what to look for.
Well if there's a book then… wait there's a book about Harry Potter as well, and he also only exist in imagination.
You do know that Harry Potter is fiction, and presented as such. The other is not. If you did take the Harry Potter book as a nation's early history, as poetry, as wisdom literature, as an explanation for life, and the revelation of God, and prophecy for the future, then that person has more problems than meet the eye.
Yes, Rowling was being honest,
So were the writers of the other books. Just because you maybe don't want to think the Israelite history happened, doesn't mean it didn't. Also, the idea that an author like Rowling writes a fiction book and calls it such, doesn't mean there aren't any other books on history. or the other genres mentioned.
Now that would be a silly suggestion! Yet, there you go. Your choice. I don't understand it, like so much of what you say, that isn't surprising we are on such different sides of the coin in so many matters. Gotta side with reason and logic and this one too.Actually when you read books of fiction they are written as factual. If one didn't see the fiction category on the jacket one would not know it was fiction. They are written to convince you that the stories are real as to make you feel a part of the story. If the bible was put together today it would be a labels a book of short fictions. Or are you going to attempt to convince me that the universe is 6000 years old and a global flood lasting a year happened 4000 years ago.
I can see how that could be true for some of the stories. The totality of the bible, however, doesn't read like fiction. It doesn't read like it is meant to be taken as fiction by the authors. That they would invest so much time and effort so long ago just to share works of fiction also doesn't seem very reasonable to me. It was a much larger endeavor than it is say for Rowling today, to whip out a book. At any rate, the most honest way to read a book I think, is to read it as the author intended it to be read.
I would like to disabuse you of your views of me, again, just so you don't accidentally keep making the same mistakes about them. For instance, I don't hold the view that the earth is 6000 years old, and not convinced of a global flood, etc. So in fairness, you ought to not make those parts of your argument against my views, when they aren't my views actually. I will attempt to do the same for you and think that is fair.Sorry, but your claiming the bible as factual and then when I show you sections that are not factual you claim you don't hold those views.
Harry Potter doesn't read like fiction either. Fast forward a few thousand years and find the text without the word fiction and you'd see it's not written as fiction.
Sure the bible was not written as fiction as it was written with the intend to encourage a group of people. The story of a global flood is written as factual and was not factual as we would have evidence of it taking place. Actually a global food would have ruined all fresh water lakes.I said it is to be read, as the authors intended it to be read. I think it is the best we can do. I am being fair, as that is how JK Rowling also writes, as do MOST authors. Most don't try to trick, and if you disagree, just ask them. If you asked Rowling, she would tell you as much.
I think part of the disconnect here is that you are insisting what the texts DO or MUST mean. You aren't even one that holds to these texts in question, yet you insist on what they must mean to me? Or it seems you are.
I am not sure that if we fast forwarded 1k years, that Harry Potter would read as history, or non fiction. Who would take it as such even then? Not sure that is a most reasonable suggestion there. It doesn't carry the point over, imo.
Here is what I believe. I believe what is most reasonable and true. I believe what makes the most logical sense when all preconceived notions are taken off the table of ideas. Laying things out one at a time helps. I ought to do hubs on this perhaps. I have a method that I come to and its not a jump or leap, but really rather methodical, or can be for sure. So its hard to flesh out the ideas in a short and cohesive manner in a forum post. I suggest taking it in steps to see the points, which can be taken one at a time. The jump is what some people can't get behind. I can start at any point, make the point, then move to the next one, and think very honestly about what best explains, "X"
We could very likely agree on the individual points, when people are feeling especially open and honest. Like what general cause and effect looks like. Like can A be a sufficient cause for B, or not, and why? (for a lack of better way of putting it.) We would likely agree on such matters, but for people here to insist on keeping on making the leap and pre defining the said topic and what it must mean to people like me, isn't helping us really.You're making a very big assertion the authors intended the bible to read as the absolute truth considering no one really knows who the authors were.
In fact, those authors could have started their works with this disclaimer, which went missing or was removed later:
"All characters portrayed within this book are fictitious and any resemblance to persons living or dead is purely coincidental."I think one can tell a lot from the context of a text, and the surrounding books in this case. You don't have to believe or agree with me, but I think this is generally true with all books written. I think a good mind can tell how or what the point of view. If it is for pleasure reading, fun fiction as in JK Rowling, then it is what it is even though someone can "escape into" that as part of the pleasure of the read. They don't really read it as true however, and I don't think they will in 1k years. I could be wrong, but I don't think so. It doesn't make logical sense.
You may have a point about the authors, to a degree. If it is being suggested we have to know the actual name of the author to get a feel for the writing as a work, then I don't know that that idea carries through.Yes, exactly in the same way it doesn't make logical sense to believe the Bible is true, either.
Good point. Hey, there may be a Harry Potter cult in a couple thousand years.
Well, to someone that thinks JK Rowling's Harry Potter , and the ancient Israelites history reads like one and the same. I personally think that case has not been made, and think its an illogical assertion. We each have to decide if that is a more fair point than it is unreasonable one. I take the latter.
Please point out where in any of the Harry Potter books the author points out that the stories are fiction.
That point, or request, makes my point. You don't have to point out, "by the way readers, this is indeed fiction, fyi," or some such comment in Harry Potter books. Nor on the spine or dust cover, because you can tell from the reading of it, and the surrounding texts, which would be the series, in this case, since you like that example. If I am mistaken, and you are really unsure if those are real stories or not, let me know, as I am running with the idea you weren't unclear on that.
Some thought it was clever that some of you thought reading the bible and Harry Potter were one and the same, because "fiction" isn't written on the side. I said that it works if the reading of the BIble reads like Harry Potter, one is like the other. It so clearly isn't, and the case hasn't been made, so I sided with what is more reasonable. That you say to point out where a Harry Potter book specifically states that the stories are fiction makes no sense, to support the idea that the books read the same to you (which was the post before, that I was rebutting the prior post about.).
Now that I think about it, some of the texts to indicate in the text, (in the bible) what they are, and what the intent is, like a genealogy, or a psalm of David. They may not be in the original texts, but this then misses the whole point of the original convo anyway. You defended a harder to defend point, and now are trying to give me a ridiculous request. Not gonna fly for the reasons I have laid out.
They do read the same, magic filled fantasies. Dumbledore is God and Harry is Jesus.You're probably half right because J.K. Rowling is catholic. J.R.R. Tolkien and C.S. Lewis basically did the same thing with The Lord Of The Rings and The Chronicles of Narnia.
PS It's funny you say Dumbledore is God, because Dumbledore turned out to be gay.The anagram to 'Albus Dumbledore' becomes 'Male bods rule, bud.'
All Voldemort wanted was immortality and he divided his soul to get it defeated only by a (spoiler alert)!!!!!!!!! mothers love for her son and a boys courage.
Sounds oddly familiar... Harry died, too!
And he came back.I find the similarities between Santa and God even more astounding. Some (I didn't) tell their children that Santa who lives forever is always watching and judging if you are bad or good and if you are good he will give you what you ask for.
The biggest difference between Santa and God though is what we observe in people that ever believed in Santa. (Which is a lot more than God, obviously so....)
The difference is, that the children grow up, learn the facts, and adjust their view to fit the facts and reasoning. You just don't see adults genuinely believing in Santa anymore. The ongoing equating Santa with God breaks down, and what we observe would also make sense IF God indeed did exist and the same people saw very good and reasonable reasons for believing in Him.
So you get adults that ditch one belief, and hold on to the other. It turns out, for the very same reasons that many non theists say they use when they reject the idea of God. (Reason, logic, facts, science, belief, trust, etc.)That same applies to belief in gods, children grow up, learn the facts and adjust their view to fit the facts and reasoning.
That isn't necessarily true at all. I do believe it is a view/belief you personally hold though. (Based on other posts from you.) The observation we all make (which is true) is that one group ditches ideas about Santa, for logical reasons, and people hold onto views of God and many can give very logical reasons for doing so. Just making factual observations, which seem to support what I said.
Many people when falling for the "idea that one is exactly like the other", do ditch God, but they don't have the same good reasons they did for ditching Santa. Its a tactic I think, to make people feel stupid for believing in God still. The ideas behind the suggestions are good or not.Sorry, but we both know there are no logical reasons for holding beliefs in any gods, it is all about faith, not logic.
No tactics needed, just the simple observation of not having any good reasons to believe in Santa or God. If people are getting the impression they are stupid because they hold beliefs in gods, then they should look at why they are feeling stupid.Nah, it IS a tactic to make them as one and the same, and keep on suggesting that to people. For those that aren't taught critical thinking by the time they hear this, especially by professors that ought to know better, then it is easy to fall prey to this tactic. The way kids are being taught now isn't helping. Professors and others shouldn't abuse their position like we often hear about to push their own agenda or worldview, but they do. Not by putting people down like they are stupid like they would be for still believing in santa.
Basically, your first part is you sharing your beliefs, that it is all about faith and not logic for believers. You even have believers here proving that point wrong every day. The days I have been on here lately anyway. Its proven point by point, when its proven. Not with assertions and beliefs or just denials either. With good reasoning, facts, logic, or a combo of those.Sorry, but that is entirely false. While there may be the odd few who might do that, for the vast majority, that isn't true at all.
It's the same thing as believing gods.
I can see how you, as a believer, would assert that, but it isn't anywhere near the truth. There is no good reasoning, facts or logic in believing in gods or Santa."It is the mark of an educated mind to be able to entertain a thought without accepting it." - Aristotle
This, EncephaloiDead (ATM), is where I think you so often fall short. You don't properly entertain the alternative viewpoint and treat it as a valid concept that scores of people, including scholars, philosophers, and scientists believe as well. You only consider it lightly, only thinking in terms of God being this simplistic 2D cartoon invisible magician, so when you look at reality it makes sense you see nothing that resembles this God. But that doesn't necessarily mean God doesn't exist. It just means your invisible cartoon magician concept of a God doesn't exist. Do you really think this concept that so many believe, including highly educated and rational people, is really as easy to dismiss as you often try to make it out to be? Or do you think maybe you're just not giving it proper consideration?
"A little philosophy inclineth man's mind to atheism, but depth in philosophy bringeth men's minds about to religion." - Sir Francis Bacon
I tend to see it more this way, except maybe the "religion" part. I'd substitute "God" for "religion" there, but the idea is the same. I do entertain the thought of materialism, and can understand how others can accept it as a worldview, but when applied to all that life experience is and when carried through to its logical conclusions, I find it lacking in some pretty significant and truly troubling ways.That is probably a very unhealthy obsession. Should I too connect you with other members here and obsess about it?
Being dishonest about that doesn't really help your argument in any way. My understandings of your god and every other god are based entirely on what the scriptures say about them, not your childish version of it.
Nor, does it mean God exists. See how that works?
That's interesting considering that few if any non-believers follow your label of "materialism", which has already been shown to be an invalid label due to quantum field and chaos theory.
I too find it lacking and insignificant, so we agree."My understandings of your god and every other god are based entirely on what the scriptures say about them, not your childish version of it."
That right there is exactly what I'm talking about. To you my views are childish. Not equal yet opposing, but childish. Beneath you. Less than. It's your belief that my beliefs, and others who believe as I do, are due either to un-intelligence/lack of logic and reason, or some level of delusion that compartmentalizes and keeps intelligence/logic at bay where spiritual beliefs are concerned. Stereotyping, basically. Reducing an entire category of people down to a simplistic concept and then convincing yourself they all fit within that definition. It ultimately shows a deficiency in critical thinking.
Also, I don't think you're fooling anyone, ATM. If so, you're not fooling everyone.Religious beliefs are as childish as beliefs in Santa. Beliefs in Santa are not "beneath" me, they are just childish beliefs that are shed when people grow up.
Indoctrination, basically.
Actually, it just shows how successful and widespread the tools of indoctrination work.
Then, by all means, keep obsessing about it if that's what it takes to get you through the day.I don't understand. You talk incessantly about how honest you are and how dishonest everyone else is. Why is the fact that you are ATM an issue for you at all? It's not like revealing your personal name or info.
You can prove that, how?
And, where did I ever say I was or was not ATM?
You people sure like to obsess about the most ridiculous things, especially when you make up stuff to argue about amongst yourselves.
I can link you to a number of other members here and claim you are this person or that person.
But, that would childish.Not trying to prove it... it's up to you if you want to confirm or deny, it can remain your little secret if you'd like. No big deal. Just wondered why the intrigue.
It sure appears that when believers arguments fail, they turn to obsessing about the person, who else they might be, what they're usernames are all about, that they sound angry or frustrated.
It's really funny to watch, but after a while, it gets lame.
Those who obsess with other members still haven't figured out what discussion forums are all about. It doesn't matter one iota who they are, where they live or what they had for breakfast. It's all about the content of the posts and nothing more. Since you can't seem to stay focused on the content, why are you even here?"It sure appears that when believers arguments fail, they turn to obsessing about the person"
That's funny, because that's what you do. When your arguments fail, if you've even bothered to make an argument, you then turn your attention to how their minds must work. To the indoctrination that must make them hold on to childish beliefs. Nothing more to ponder, it's them. Not you, heavens no, can't be, must be them. It's the other side of the argument that just doesn't get it. They're delusional. Must be. Nevermind that, unlike Santa, a large number of adults continue to hold spiritual beliefs the world over long after childhood has ended. They must all just be not as enlightened as you are. That must be it. It's them.
And yes, after a while, it gets lame.Sorry, but indoctrination is the explanation for a lot of religious beliefs, it is not something personal, like your obsession with me.
Indoctrination is not about being enlightened, it is about accepting things without criticism or question, whether they are true or not.If you'd like, you can settle the matter. Are you ATM?
The only matters to settle are the unhealthy obsessions people are displaying here.
Not an obsession, just an observation. Obsessive behavior would more resemble one who continues to participate in forum discussions under a different guise for whatever reason. Maybe it's because the other avatar has been banned, or because it has in some way garnered unwanted attention in some way, yet this person just can't stay away and will return by any means necessary. Even if that means continually denying his ties to the former.
Wow, still obsessing. Perhaps, you need to get some help.
Ed... don't worry about it. Just keep being yourself, it ain't no thang.
Uh, you are the one who is worrying about it, not me.
This is exactly what most people do. It isn't only seen in religion. It is normal human behavior.
For some here, it might be normal behavior, but to others it certainly isn't.
Accepting things without question is "normal" in that most people do it. It's probably a natural self defense mechanism. People don't tend to want to get out of their comfort zones.
It's fine to speak for yourself in that regard. It's not how others operate, though.
Why do you think people accept things without question?
Probably, a number of reasons, depending on the person. Often, it is just intellectual laziness coupled with a lack of education. Or, they have been indoctrinated to believe something is absolutely true and wind up swallowing whatever comes close to that belief and rejecting everything else, including facts and evidence to the contrary.
You're probably right Jane. I indoctrinate my kids not to talk to strangers and not to run in front of cars. I indoctrinate them to try and eat healthy and to drink water.... to turn off the TV and go play outside. I'm always indoctrinating them with stuff like that.
Great quotes and observations there. Requesting that something be given proper or even some consideration when someone isn't doing so, is a good thing to do.
As for discussing and considering the other point of view, that isn't so easy, but its a good exercise. There is no way everyone can be right, and none of us could be right, but we also could be. One view IS correct, because logically, that is how truth works. If we were on the wrong side of truth, what you describe above is one way to possibly ever find it.
I hope the ideas are really considered. Otherwise, there is no point in spending one minute in discussing any of this.
You have to keep in mind that the story as you read it is how it was interpreted and translated many generations after the fact. The actual Hebrew just explains a devastating flood. But when people long after the fact read this story, translators translated 'all the land' as 'all the earth' and 'hills' became 'mountains'. The actual authors could not have known whether the flood was global or not. They just knew it engulfed all the world as they knew it. It's our modern minds reading this that thinks of a global scale.
You mean the same limited mind/frame of mind that described how everything was created?
Yes, actually. Creation is explained from a very human perspective. But if the stories are true in that early on God interacted with Adam, Eve, Cain, Abel, Enoch, then the authors could actually have had knowledge of the order in which things were created through those interactions. But these interactions happened, and stopped, long before the flood. After the flood God is only said to have interacted with specific individuals. So it's possible the creation account authors could have known that information, yet not had the same insights for anything from that point forward.
Oh ok, so you believe that the authors of the creation story were not the same as the ones later on in the book of Genesis? According to what?
It's known the books of Moses are pieced together from multiple sources. The creation account is recognized as being its own piece. It's thought to probably be a song. Something told (or sang) orally for numerous generations. If it was a song, then this would presumably yield better accuracy over a long period of time.
What about other views of Creation? Why is this one more viable to you? If you had grown up in/around Shinto, do you think you'd have come to the same conclusions you do, now? (I doubt it)
I think you make a great point, and I want to answer it also because this idea means a great deal to me. The fact that any of us could have been born into any area at any time, and been brought up to believe anything different than we were, is exactly the reason I test my own views the hardest. I didn't always think like that, but this point is one of the reasons that I must do that to be intellectually honest, and hold onto intellectual integrity which is something I value very much.
In so doing, I think that by critically testing and putting my view's "feet to the fire" as it were, I could THEN actually say wow, this idea isn't playing out logically, not matching reality, not the most reasonable of all the views considering all we know, etc. Then, I could happily ditch it even if disappointed I was so wrong for however long that was. Then, I can adopt a more reasonable view, a worldview that matches my actual view of the world. What view makes the MOST sense considering the world we live in and humanity and its history, what most lines up with that? My ideas have to be able to continually stand on their own, or else consider being ditched, as I value truth.
So I trust that people world over can do the same, no matter what they were taught OR previously chose to believe. Everyone has a measure of revelation given to them. At the very least they observe the reality around them they can observe, and then respond to that.
Then please explain how a boat that size (which would have been unable to float) floated for a year without seeing any land in a regional flood? How could a regional food cover mountains when we all know water doesn't work that way. Take the recent tsunami's for example, water rushes in and searched because of gravity for lower ground. It makes no sense.
Who says it would be unable to float. A wealthy dutch businessman actually constructed an ark exactly to the specifications given and it floats ...
http://www.cnn.com/2012/07/30/world/eur … oah-dutch/Huibers and his team built the boat by welding together the metal hulls of 25 barges into a single frame, which was then covered with Scandinavian pine. Weighing about 3,000 tons, the boat contains sleeping quarters, a theater, restaurant and conference facilities to seat 1,500 people.
Exactly to the specifications?You're right, "exactly to the specifications" isn't the right way to word that. I was referring to the measurements given. The comment I was responding to was suggesting a boat of this size and proportion would not float.
So it would not unless it had 25 floating vessels welded together. It is not an actual boat of that size and proportion - it is 25 smaller vessels welded together and then disguised to look that way. Still - close enough for you I suppose?
The point is a vessel built the shape and size given does indeed float. It's not so much the material as it is the size/shape/displacement of water/etc.
It is not a vessel in its own right. It is 25 small vessels welded together and disguised to look like a large vessel. But - close enough for you I suppose.
It makes the point even more actually. Quite impressive.
- Sure, the vessel could have been made with pumice.
"Despite his best efforts, it was impossible to adhere entirely to the biblical description of the Ark. Genesis describes Noah's boat as made of "gopher wood," but experts disagree over what this is.
Instead, Huibers and his team built the boat by welding together the metal hulls of 25 barges into a single frame, which was then covered with Scandinavian pine. "Right, but a boat by those specifications does indeed float. I suspect if you're sinking that kind of money into a project, and you're not able to match the specifications where 'gopher wood' is concerned, then it might be wise to use the materials he did. The biblical ark only needed to serve a purpose for a short time. I'm sure he wants his to last longer.
Sure it floats welding together the metal hulls of 25 barges into a single frame.
Do we really need to get into a discussion about physics where water vessels are concerned? An ark that matches the measurements specified in the text really does float. This means that the specifications given really do describe a vessel that is buoyant. An even heavier version, with metal structures instead of wood, floats as well. So, the measurements given do describe a very much sea-worthy vessel.
Weight has nothing to do with it. This is not a vessel in its own right. As your article stated - it was not possible to build it following the specs in the babble. This is 25 metal floats welded together and disguised to look like a larger vessel. Good enough for believers it seems.
Canal worthy also.The only reason the article says they couldn't do so to spec is because nobody knows what exactly 'gopher wood' is. So, because he could not match this specification, he opted to "weld together the metal hulls of 25 barges into a single frame". Whether the frame had been made out of wood, or re-purposed barge material, is irrelevant. It's the size and shape that is relevant. We all know there were plenty of boats made almost entirely of wood that sailed the globe. When it's constructed as described, and sealed as described, it really can float.
Gopher wood is extinct? If not then find out all the wood of the region and see if any of it can match the strength needed. I can already tell you wood won't do it for that large a boat. Yes, lots of wooden boats work fine. But there is a limit to how big a wooden boat can be and the ark exceeds it many times over. It would have been larger than titanic for goodness sake. Not possible with wood of ANY type. Sorry.
"God spells out to Noah the dimensions of the ark, 300 cubits by 50 by 30 – Using the longer "Egyptian royal cubit" of 529mm, this works out at 158.7m long by 26.45m wide by 15.87m high (520 feet 8 inches long by 86 feet 9.3 inches wide by 52 feet 0.8 inches high). - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Noah%27s_Ark
There are a number or ships on a list (follow link below) of known wooden ships that are quite large, falling only a few meters short of the size of the ark. including a couple of Greek ships that date back to 200BC. And these ships were built for extended use and to be navigated, not for a single short-lived purpose of simply staying afloat as the ark was....
The Greek Tessarakonteres - 128×18 m - (meaning 40 files of oarsmen) reportedly carried a crew of 400, was powered by 4000 oarsmen and transported 2850 soldiers, according to Athenaeus and Plutarch (Life of Demetrios). - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_lo … oden_shipsYou didn't mention that Tessarakonteres was for display of power only. It never went to sea. It was hard and dangerous to move. The Chinese Treasure ships had various sizes, and again, the largest ones that match the ark were for displays of power only. Imagine seeing such a ship in dock? Not knowing it couldn't do battle if it tried you'd run and hide, or at least that was the hope.
The biggest wooden ships that were used were less than half the size of the ark's 450 foot length. coming in at around 180 feet long.
This is well over 5000 years of wooden ship building after Noah and they still couldn't make a wooden ship the size of the ark, even with double hulls and triple bracing which the bible does not mention. Do you think Noah had the skills that ship builders thousands of years later didn't have? Come now.No, but I think an ark built to the specifications given could very well have been constructed and would serve the intended purpose. These other ships were commissioned for extended/repeated use and what made them most difficult size wise was in being able to maneuver them. if you simply need a large cargo barge to sustain a long period of flooding it wouldn't need the same level of stability.
But it should be telling that such an ancient text would describe such a large vessel whose dimensions really would make for a buoyant design, presumably long before anyone in the world would have had that level of knowledge or understood what would be required to accomplish such a task.Again, the larges ships never went anywhere, not just because you couldn't steer them but because they were not sea worthy, Display only! And no. Noah's ship would not have been buoyant, It would have leaked like a sieve. And again, it did not have to just float, it had to withstand torrential rain and wind and waves that would capsize most boats today. It's simply not possible.
As for people thinking of a large ship like that? Sure, why not? We think of warp speed but no one can do it. Fantasy can think of anything.It would not have leaked. That particular detail was covered in the directions ... "So make yourself an ark of cypress wood; make rooms in it and coat it with pitch inside and out."
"Again, the larges ships never went anywhere"
That's not true. In the description of the largest Greek vessel on the list, the Tessarakonteres, it says it "reportedly carried a crew of 400, was powered by 4000 oarsmen and transported 2850 soldiers, according to Athenaeus and Plutarch". And it also says, "According to Athenaeus, during the tests the ship was difficult and dangerous to move."
That doesn't sound to me like it was only used for display purposes.You obviously didn't drill down on the name of the boat to get whole story. It was for display only.
"Ptolemy Philopator built [a ship] of forty banks of oars, which had a length of two hundred and eighty cubits, and a height, to the top of her stern, of forty-eight; she was manned by four hundred sailors, who did no rowing, and by four thousand rowers, and besides these she had room, on her gangways and decks, for nearly three thousand men-at‑arms. But this ship was merely for show; and since she differed little from a stationary edifice on land, being meant for exhibition and not for use, she was moved only with difficulty and danger."Okay, so that's what the Roman historian who lived 400 years later said. Even if that is the case, when they moved the ship, do you think they picked this huge thing up and carried it around, or do you think it was probably moved on the water?
Not directed at me, but I would have to go with the more logical and reasonable option there. What makes the most sense.
Until, you place two of every species of animal in world and the food and water required for a year. Then, it sinks.
In the world? What part of a regional flood are you having such trouble understanding? Why do you think bronze age people writing about a flood would know that that flood covered the entire globe? How could they?
An interesting side note is that flood stories were not unique to near-Eastern literature. The Greeks had a story where the world was destroyed in a flood, or rather humanity was wiped out, and Zeus created new humans by throwing rocks over his shoulder. And Celtic (Irish) mythology actually has the founding of Ireland from a small band of people who floated there in a boat after the world was flooded.
Yes, it's incredibly interesting just how far-reaching these flood stories are all around the world. Which could either suggest the highly unlikely global flood scenario, or it could also suggest the much more likely scenario that early descendants of all the civilized cultures around the world were all in the same geographic location when a regional flood occurred. In the context of the biblical story, Egypt, Greece, Rome, even China and beyond, would share this common history because they were all born of those born of Shem/Ham/Japheth before being scattered at Babel. So everyone scattered from that point would have a faint memory of a catastrophic flood in their recent past.
Lots of people had floods at different times in history. Lots of civilizations were affected by them. Most would have thought they were the only people on the planet. So the fact there is more than one story is not a big deal and it doesn't prove a world wide flood.
I didn't say it proved anything. Only that it's consistent with the story the bible is describing. Both the highly unlikely global flood scenario, or the much more likely scenario that we know to be at least partially true in that nearly every civilized culture capable of recording written historical tales descend from cultures that originated on the 'Eurasian' continent.
All the Creation myths of the region are the same story. The Sumerian pantheon became the Babylonian, Assyrian, Greek, and Roman pantheon. While the Hebrews took the stories as their own, they didn’t take the pantheon. Instead they had one god. But at first he had sons, who would be gods by default, but later they became angels
The Sumerian story:
The primeval sea (abzu) existed before anything else and within that, the heaven (an) and the earth (ki) were formed. The boundary between heaven and earth was a solid (perhaps tin) vault, and the earth was a flat disk. Within the vault lay the gas-like 'lil', or atmosphere, the brighter portions therein formed the stars, planets, sun, and moon. (Kramer, The Sumerians 1963: pp. 112-113) Each of the four major Sumerian deities is associated with one of these regions. An, god of heaven, may have been the main god of the pantheon prior to 2500 BC., although his importance gradually waned. (Kramer 1963 p. 118) Ki is likely to be the original name of the earth goddess, whose name more often appears as Ninhursag (queen of the mountains), Ninmah (the exalted lady), or Nintu (the lady who gave birth). It seems likely that these two were the progenitors of most of the gods.
Nammu is the Goddess of the watery abyss, the primeval sea. She creates the sea that permeates everything and will create An/heaven and Ki/the earth.
Enki and Ninmah create man from the heart of the clay over the Abzu. Several flawed versions were created and destroyed before the final version was complete. The made us because the gods needed help tending the earth and dredging the rivers.
This is the same as the Genesis story where god divides the waters and makes a heaven and earth between them. The mechanical version of Genesis even says that god created a sheet between heaven and earth, just like the Sumerian version says.
Babylonian creation myth
Marduk armed himself with a bow and arrows, a club, and lightning, and he went in search of Tiamat's monstrous army. Rolling his thunder and storms in front him, he attacked, and Kingu's battle plan soon disintegrated. Tiamat was left alone to fight Marduk, and she howled as they closed for battle. They struggled as Marduk caught her in his nets. When she opened her mouth to devour him, he filled it with the evil wind that served him. She could not close her mouth with his gale blasting in it, and he shot an arrow down her throat. It split her heart, and she was slain.
After subduing the rest of her host, he took his club and split Tiamat's water-laden body in half like a clam shell. Half he put in the sky and made the heavens, and he posted guards there to make sure that Tiamat's salt waters could not escape. Across the heavens he made stations in the stars for the gods, and he made the moon and set it forth on its schedule across the heavens. From the other half of Tiamat's body he made the land, which he placed over Apsu's fresh waters, which now arise in wells and springs. From her eyes he made flow the Tigirs and Euphrates. Across this land he made the grains and herbs, the pastures and fields, the rains and the seeds, the cows and ewes, and the forests and the orchards.
Marduk set the vanquished gods who had supported Tiamat to a variety of tasks, including work in the fields and canals. Soon they complained of their work, however, and they rebeled by burning their spades and baskets. Marduk saw a solution to their labors, though, and proposed it to Ea. He had Kingu, Timat's general, brought forward from the ranks of the defeated gods, and Kingu was slain. With Kingu's blood, with clay from the earth, and with spittle from the other gods, Ea and the birth-goddess Nintu created humans. On them Ea imposed the labor previously assigned to the gods. Thus the humans were set to maintain the canals and boundary ditches, to hoe and to carry, to irrigate the land and to raise crops, to raise animals and fill the granaries, and to worship the gods at their regular festivals.”
Notice how marduc creates the world by killing the goddess Tiamat who is salt water, by dividing her and putting half her body in the sky and from the other half he created land.
This is again the same as the Genesis story where god divides the waters and makes a heaven and earth between them.
The Greek story is similar to the Babylonian story where Zeus must kill his parents the titans to create order from chaos.
In the beginning, Chaos, an amorphous, gaping void encompassing the entire universe, and surrounded by an unending stream of water ruled by the god Oceanus, was the domain of a goddess named Eurynome, which means "far-ruling" or "wide-wandering".
Eurynome separated the sky from the sea by dancing on the waves of Oceanus. In this manner, she created great lands upon which she might wander, a veritable universe, populating it with exotic creatures such as Nymphs, Furies, and Charites as well as with countless beasts and monsters.
She was the Goddess of All Things, and desired to make order out of the Chaos. By coupling with a huge and powerful snake, Ophion, or as some legends say, coupling with the North Wind, she gave birth to Eros, god of Love, also known as Protagonus, the "firstborn".
Notice again that the universe is filled with water. She dances on the water.
In the mechanical version of the bible “Elohiym [Powers]” was much fluttering upon the face of the water,”
The Sumerians not only influenced all these later cultures, every one of them took the story for their own and changed it to suit their culture and time.
Did the Sumerians get this story from some other culture? Perhaps, but the problem is that culture was still too primitive to have written language, so is prehistoric. In any event, it all starts with Sumer, and all the other versions are later adoptions. The Hebrew version was not fully written down until 400 BCE.I know the traditional way it's viewed, and I understand the logic behind it. The Sumerian/Akkadian/Babylonian mythological stories were prevalent throughout the region. Undoubtedly well known, and very well had an influence on all that came after.
But as an alternative hypothesis to test the data against, consider just for a moment the Genesis story as I'm describing is true. Imagine beings were created as described in Mesopotamia roughly 5500BC in an already populated world living centuries-long lifespans. One of these beings, the farmer, was cast out, separated from the rest. He was told the ground would not yield food for him and that he'd be a 'wrestless wonderer' on the earth', yet in the very next line it says he settled and built a city. It then goes on to list six of his generations, the last of which it specifies being the ones who 'fathered' different groups consisting of different traits. Then comes an altercation of some kind where one of those descendants was attacked and wounded by... someone.
It then goes on to explain that the humans that had become more numerous in the region, due to the emergence of a city, had begun to catch the eyes of these beings, and they began to marry and have children with them. These humans are described as mortal in comparison, living only mortal lives. The resulting offspring between the two bloodlines are described by the author as being the 'heroes of old, men of renown'. It also says that humanity had changed significantly, becoming wicked and violent, which is said to be the reason for the flood. About a century later the descendants of the surviving beings, chosen because of favorable traits, are scattered all throughout a world already populated by humans. It says they were scattered because they were building a city and tower. Because they all spoke one language it says they'd basically be able to do whatever they imagined. Once scattered, each group eventually began to do the same. They started building cities that ultimately became civilizations. Each with their own unique language. Abraham's story then picks up a few centuries later in a land where both Sumer and Egypt exist.
The timeline here is important. The Ubaid Period (pre-flood) 5500-4000BC, the flood 4000BC, Babel 3900BC, building of Uruk and beginning of Uruk culture 3800-3000BC. This places Abraham's lifetime as being mid 4th millennium BC, in the first centuries of those first budding civilizations. The continued mixing with humans continued to shorten lifespans each generation leading up to Abraham, who it says lived to 175. By the time Abraham died, nearly all long-living ancestors had died as well. All at roughly the same time...
... which means the end of a roughly 2000 year span where numerous immortal beings walked the earth among humans came to an end a thousand or more years before the oldest known writings.
The Sumerians are an incredibly interesting group. Though from an archaeological standpoint the Ubaid and Uruk periods are counted as two distinct cultures, according to the Sumerian stories these were the pre and post flood portions of their history. The first city-state built during the Ubaid, Eridu (about 5300BC), was said by the Sumerians to be the first Sumerian city-state. Though there had been numerous long-lasting, highly populated cultures that came and went a couple of thousand years before to the north in modern day Turkey and into Europe where the climate was much more conducive to agricultural practices, Eridu was distinct in a number of ways. First, it's the pre-Sumerian's use of extensive canal systems that made agriculture in this very arid part of the world possible. This was also the first place we see organized labor, with a central group organizing the tasks for a workforce, which is the beginnings of the first ever class system in a human culture, which is why Eridu is officially classed as the first human city. This proved to be a significant behavioral change that rapidly spread all throughout the world. The Ubaid period is where male-dominated cultures began, which spread rapidly as well. And it's the first city/settlement to have a temple situated in the center of the city for religious purposes. Each subsequent city-state was built the same way. Leading up to that abrupt end, the Ubaid period showed rapid urbanization working up towards the north from far south Mesopotamia. They were growing and thriving, then nothing.
2000 years or so later, once writing had become sophisticated enough to tell a narrative, the descendants of these pioneers of civilization didn't give credit to their life/world-changing ancestors. They claimed gods gave them the gifts of civilization, each known as a 'me', that made this lifestyle they developed possible. Eridu, according to them, was the first of five pre-flood Sumerian city-states and it was established by a god named Enki. It's here that it's said the 'kingship' descended from heaven. Each city-state that held the kingship ruled the land, starting with Eridu. The Sumerian king's list shows the kingship progressing north, much like the actual urbanization of the Ubaid. In an interesting parallel to the Cain story, Enki also had six generations of descendants, and its these that are said to have created humanity to do their work for them. According to the Sumerians they were created by these gods to provide for them. These gods physically walked the earth and physically inhabited the temple at the center. The real Eridu, as well as other Sumerian city-states, show extensive evidence of those who lived in the temple being provided for by the people of the surrounding city. In the Sumerian story, it's these humans that then got too loud (instead of wicked and violent), which is why the flood was said to have been sent. And much like the 'heroes of old, men of renown' off-spring of the mixed bloodlines in Genesis, according to the Sumerian stories these gods intermingled with humans, creating demi-gods. Gilgamesh, for example, was a demi-god, and was one of the long-living post-flood kings on the kings list. It's also after the flood that the Sumerian stories say a once universal language was confused into many. What's interesting, language-wise, is that even though most languages in the region were either semetic (Akkadian/Babylonian/Hebrew) or indo-european (HIttite/Greek/Roman), the Sumerian language was neither.
*Also, on a side note, Gilgamesh began with the Sumerians ... "The literary history of Gilgamesh begins with five independent Sumerian poems about 'Bilgamesh' (Sumerian for Gilgamesh), king of Uruk. Four of these were used as source material for a combined epic in Akkadian." - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Epic_of_gilgamesh
While other cultures certainly could have borrowed from these ancient well-known Sumerian stories, it began with the Sumerians. Their history, according to them, began before the flood with the building of Eridu, built 3000 years before writing. The archaeological finds in Sumer have only further corroborated these stories, with multiple specifically named city-states being found, each with a temple like described. The further along time went, the further away these stories got from the originals as the Akkadians and the Babylonians moved in and took over, until they barely resembled them. What's interesting about Genesis is that, even though it's estimated to have been written much later, it's more like the early Sumerian stories than the others. If the stories of Genesis actually happened as described, then they happened in an already populated region, and the people that populated that region were the humans who eventually became the Sumerians. These gods were described as moody and unpredictable. In fact, the Sumerians invented astronomy through their attempts to better understand these gods, who as you pointed out they associated with quadrants of the sky. They began tracking the movements of the heavens in an attempt to better anticipate the shifting moods of their gods.
What began in the Ubaid/Uruk cultures, completely transformed the world. The Sumerians invented civilization, the first laws, government, the wheel, astronomy, mathematics, and the first written language. And while plenty of other civilizations wrote mythological origin stories, none wrote stories so closely resembling the actual history of the region as the Sumerians. If you first realize Genesis isn't describing Adam as the first human ever, but rather a being created separate from humanity in an already populated world, then what Genesis describes lines right up with Sumerian history as well. Only, in that version, it's Adam's descendants who are the gods in the Sumerian version. Both describe how civilization first came to be. And the dramatic changes we see in humanity, both in inventions/lifestyle, as well as behavioral changes, actually started right where those stories say they did. Only in the Genesis version, it gives a detailed timeline that spans 2000 years that accurately lines up with each significant event down to the number of centuries in between. Quite a feat if these weren't written until after 900BC, over 4000 years after. That version, which tells a very similar story from a more inside perspective, has since made a significant impression throughout the rest of the world in every age since, unlike any other mythological story from that region.
Given the evidence which corroborates the story being told and the significant shifts that can be seen happening in that time frame as a result of those events, I'd say this hypothesis lines up much better with the evidence than the standard model you detailed, as the standard model attributes the inventions and progressions in lifestyle to the beginning of highly-populated societies, even though highly-populated societies were around thousands of years prior, and it attributes these myths to being multiple versions borrowing from the Sumerian version, which has no explanation as far as an origin.“I know the traditional way it's viewed, and I understand the logic behind it. The Sumerian/Akkadian/Babylonian mythological stories were prevalent throughout the region. Undoubtedly well known, and very well had an influence on all that came after.”
What I put forth is my view after having studied it. But if that is also the traditional view that’s fine.
“But as an alternative hypothesis to test the data against, consider just for a moment the Genesis story as I'm describing is true. Imagine beings were created as described in Mesopotamia roughly 5500BC in an already populated world living centuries-long lifespans. One of these beings, the farmer, was cast out, separated from the rest.”
The farmer is Adam? So if I read you right not only are there others on the outside of the garden now, there are others still in the garden? You really are taking a leap from the few words of the text that does not even mention others but does say one of the sons of Adam went out to get himself a wife in another city when they were supposed to be the only ones around. I buy that Adam was the first Hebrew who would father the line, not the first human, and they made up a special story to explain him, but you are saying he’s a magic being.
You know what this means, right? None of us have original sin because we are not descended from Adam. Or did that sin “gene” eventually work its way in to the population of mortals?
As for long life spans how do you know what constituted a year in prehistoric times? Could be a month or a season or who knows what? These long life spans may be a fabrication, imagination of the writers. Doesn’t the bible say somewhere that a year is 124 days or something? That would cut all these long life spans to a third.
“ He was told the ground would not yield food for him and that he'd be a 'wrestless wonderer' on the earth', yet in the very next line it says he settled and built a city. It then goes on to list six of his generations, the last of which it specifies being the ones who 'fathered' different groups consisting of different traits. Then comes an altercation of some kind where one of those descendants was attacked and wounded by... someone.”
They were meeting people from different cultures. They had to explain them somehow.
“It then goes on to explain that the humans that had become more numerous in the region, due to the emergence of a city, had begun to catch the eyes of these beings, and they began to marry and have children with them.”
In the bible they are sons of god. Meaning they were gods. In Enoch they were the watchers, satans that decided to mate with human woman because god never made them female angels because he thought they would never need woman being as they lived in heaven with the glory of god. But somehow they weren’t all that happy with what god intended for them.
Traditionally angels do not have free will, but these seem to have. So that puts them back to gods. But that’s impossible because there is only one god. So let me get this straight, the angels of Enoch and the sons of god are actually the descendants of Adam? Is that what you are trying to say?
“ These humans are described as mortal in comparison, living only mortal lives. The resulting offspring between the two bloodlines are described by the author as being the 'heroes of old, men of renown'. It also says that humanity had changed significantly, becoming wicked and violent,
They were supposed to be giants. Much bigger than humans.
“which is said to be the reason for the flood. About a century later the descendants of the surviving beings, chosen because of favorable traits, are scattered all throughout a world “
What was that you said about god wanting people to have free will? Care to take that back now?
“already populated by humans. It says they were scattered because they were building a city and tower. Because they all spoke one language it says they'd basically be able to do whatever they imagined.”
Yes, how absurd. God was afraid they would walk in to heaven. How would having the same language and building a tower give them the power to do anything? Not too rational on god’s part if you ask me. And about free will again....
“ Once scattered, each group eventually began to do the same. They started building cities that ultimately became civilizations. Each with their own unique language. Abraham's story then picks up a few centuries later in a land where both Sumer and Egypt exist.”
So god failed to stop them doing what wanted to do by scattering them, and then he allows them to eventually build skyscrapers and go to the moon. Suddenly he isn’t afraid they will walk into heaven anymore?
Again, the tower myth is just a way of explaining why different people developed different cultures and languages. I don’t think you will find an ounce of truth in it. It is an absurd story with absurd reasoning. But it does serve as a model for why there are different cultures if we are all descendants of Adam. A rather bad one but there you go. Models don’t always reflect reality.
“The timeline here is important. The Ubaid Period (pre-flood) 5500-4000BC, the flood 4000BC, Babel 3900BC, building of Uruk and beginning of Uruk culture 3800-3000BC. This places Abraham's lifetime as being mid 4th millennium BC, in the first centuries of those first budding civilizations.”
Where do you get a date for Babel or this flood? A small regional flood that really would not have had much impact on humanity outside Iraq.
The continued mixing with humans continued to shorten lifespans each generation leading up to Abraham, who it says lived to 175. By the time Abraham died, nearly all long-living ancestors had died as well. All at roughly the same time...
“... which means the end of a roughly 2000 year span where numerous immortal beings walked the earth among humans came to an end a thousand or more years before the oldest known writings. “
It would have to if they were fiction.
“The Sumerians are an incredibly interesting group. Though from an archaeological standpoint the Ubaid and Uruk periods are counted as two distinct cultures, according to the Sumerian stories these were the pre and post flood portions of their history. The first city-state built during the Ubaid, Eridu (about 5300BC),”
Again, where do you get a date for this flood? No one knows when it happened. The Unaid may have been the early Sumerians, who some say originated in Siberia and wandered down to the Gulf area during the ice age, over 10000 years ago. In fact, around the same time American natives started coming to the Americas. I have a few of their creation myths which are very interesting as well, and may show a connection. This flood/creation story may not even have happened in the middle east at all, and may be 15000 to 20000 years old, adapted over time to being presented as if being a history of the Middle east.
I’m not saying I think so but I could make a case for it with a little more research.
“This proved to be a significant behavioral change that rapidly spread all throughout the world. The Ubaid period is where male-dominated cultures began, which spread rapidly as well. And it's the first city/settlement to have a temple situated in the center of the city for religious purposes. Each subsequent city-state was built the same way. Leading up to that abrupt end, the Ubaid period showed rapid urbanization working up towards the north from far south Mesopotamia. They were growing and thriving, then nothing.”
Yes. This is a major shift and does cause new behaviour because these people are meeting new cultures and all that goes along with that, mistrust, hate, but the desire to trade and get things from other lands helps to foster tolerance by many. So sh**t will often hit the fan so to speak and drastically change behaviour. It is so much easier to live in a community where everyone shares the same beliefs and values.
The same kinds of changes are happening right now in new multicultural societies. It doesn’t take a new breed of human to stir things up, it just takes a new culture to “invade” your own.
“2000 years or so later, once writing had become sophisticated enough to tell a narrative, the descendants of these pioneers of civilization didn't give credit to their life/world-changing ancestors. They claimed gods gave them the gifts of civilization,”
So the Sumerian gods are the fallen angels/sons of god, Sons of Adam? (Sons of Anarchy) lol...
How about this: Yes the Sumerians did tend to their gods. What if like all rulers their rulers claimed to be sons of gods and gods themselves. Almost all of them did that for thousands of years after Sumer. The Emperor of Japan still claims to this day to be the son of god and a god in his own right. That’s much more likely than the descendants of Adam mating with humans.
When did Adam get superpowers again? I missed that part of the bible.
And the towers they built were so that their gods could come down from heaven and go to the underworld using the tower. So heaven was not high up.
How about this: some claim all this means that Aliens came down and mated with the daughters of man. What if instead of mating we were genetic experiments? What if an alien race caused a flood to wipe out the mistakes they made? Lol...
Seriously, that fits just as well as this entire story you are telling. Not that it isn’t a well thought out story. We can’t say you aren’t trying to fit all this together and doing a fine job. But there are other explanations and much less complex ones. And some of the reasons stated for the events are downright lame, in my opinion and just show the ignorance of primitive man and his imagination. God afraid we will walk into heaven or that if we build a rower big enough and keep one language we will soon be able to do what we want is absurd illogical reasoning in the highest, even by a god..
“(Akkadian/Babylonian/Hebrew) or indo-european (HIttite/Greek/Roman), the Sumerian language was neither. “
Exactly. They were not from there originally. They were not Semitic people nor indo-European. Again, some say they may have come from Siberia or that region.
“While other cultures certainly could have borrowed from these ancient well-known Sumerian stories, it began with the Sumerians.”
Glad we agree on that at last.
“Their history, according to them, began before the flood with the building of Eridu, built 3000 years before writing.”
They say they originated from the mountains, which is why they built towers in which to house their gods, which they took with them . That implies they took an object which they viewed as being their god; This is known as an idol. They would place this “statue” which was god, on the tower, because they were mountain gods/goddesses.
“ What's interesting about Genesis is that, even though it's estimated to have been written much later, it's more like the early Sumerian stories than the others.”
No. What it is is lacking other gods for the one to fight with and interact with. So the stories are dryer. God did this then he did that. Not the gods decided this and then this god did this and then that one warned that one etc. The Sumerian stories as well as all the stories of the pantheons are soap operas. If you have one god things are calmer. You concentrate on what he said to people. There are no other characters to work with if he really is the only god.
But yes, the stories are all originally Sumerian.
“What began in the Ubaid/Uruk cultures, completely transformed the world. The Sumerians invented civilization, the first laws, government, the wheel, astronomy, mathematics, and the first written language. And while plenty of other civilizations wrote mythological origin stories, none wrote stories so closely resembling the actual history of the region as the Sumerians. If you first realize Genesis isn't describing Adam as the first human ever, but rather a being created separate from humanity in an already populated world, then what Genesis describes lines right up with Sumerian history as well. Only, in that version, it's Adam's descendants who are the gods in the Sumerian version. “
I thought that was where you were going. Puts a whole new light on Adam. Again, wasn’t Noah a direct descendant of Adam? If so then all the humans were killed off in the flood as well as the demi gods descendants. But then he puts Noah who is what: Half human half new age man, so not a “son of god” in charge of rebuilding the world?
And what happens? The reason for the flood never went away. We were still killing eachother and doing all manner of evil. What did the flood accomplish? Nothing.
And then, Noah does not have the other humans Adam had so he has to repopulate through incest. But wait, when one of his sons has sex with his mother all hell breaks loose. What? Again the story does not make sense. So because it is regional flood god saves one set of super humans and then leaves them only regular humans to mate with? So in a sense it can start over?
“Both describe how civilization first came to be. And the dramatic changes we see in humanity, both in inventions/lifestyle, as well as behavioral changes, actually started right where those stories say they did. Only in the Genesis version, it gives a detailed timeline that spans 2000 years that accurately lines up with each significant event down to the number of centuries in between. Quite a feat if these weren't written until after 900BC, over 4000 years after. That version, which tells a very similar story from a more inside perspective, has since made a significant impression throughout the rest of the world in every age since, unlike any other mythological story from that region. “
But it is the story that all of them told throughout the region after the Sumerians built cities. Not a surprise that it is retold by the Jews centering around them being the chosen people. And these changes happen due to human progress ad evolution of our societies and they still happening today. This farfetched story of gods and super humans that mate with humans is not required to explain the drastic changes city life brought and the changes in behaviour it brought with it.
And when you are working with one god instead of many that changes the way you write.
“Given the evidence which corroborates the story being told and the significant shifts that can be seen happening in that time frame as a result of those events, I'd say this hypothesis lines up much better with the evidence than the standard model you detailed, as the standard model attributes the inventions and progressions in lifestyle to the beginning of highly-populated societies, even though highly-populated societies were around thousands of years prior, and it attributes these myths to being multiple versions borrowing from the Sumerian version, which has no explanation as far as an origin.”
The societies you are talking about were not highly populated in comparison to cities and city states. And the diversity of cultures the city attracts is entirely different than when you have a large farming population living in a very spread out area, all of whom are of the same culture and the same mentality.
Evolution often comes in spurts. After a lot of small changes a tipping point comes and drastic changes start to happen. Look at the industrial revolution and the advances of science since then. Move invention and discovery were made in a hundred years than in the 100000 before. We aren’t the same people our forefathers were even 200 years ago. The world has turned on its ear, so to speak.
This is normal and doesn’t require supernatural intervention. Unless god created a new species of super humans while I wasn’t looking, who spurred on the inventions and innovations of the 19th and 20th centuries.
It’s how evolution works, it is how chaos works. The simple becomes very complex very quickly by following very simple rules. The behaviour of humans adapts to change by... guess what.... changing.
Does it really make sense to you that a God would tell one family to build a boat by themselves to house all the local animals and themselves for a year rather then telling them to leave the area? How could they possible cut and bend all that would themselves. Doesn't it seem more likely that these people exaggerated a story to suit their own needs? Perhaps going from a nasty flood where many died to a flood so impossible where only the tribes ancestors survived because God only loves us and it lasted a year. Never mind that it would have been impossible to build or stay a float.
It's easier to understand in the Sumerian version where one god decides to go against the will of the others and save one family and some animals to repopulate the world after the flood, which lasted only seven days and nights. Much more reasonable time frames.
Except you didn't think that on the same page of posts when you said,
"Impossible in the time given, for sure. 7 days. That's another aspect of the story that is impossible."
Nevermind, no one here believes in a seven day version of that, not that I know of.
Sometimes I think the desire to shoot down ideas that people aren't even really thinking about what they are saying sometimes. This likely has happened to me to, of course. Just noticing, when the point of a lot of this is showing why one's own points are best, or better than others. It is kind of what it comes down to really.
If that was a total joke, and I missed it, my apologies.This is a discussion and a debate. The idea is to put forth your ideas and have them raked over the coals to see if when you are finished they hold water. I am willing to say I made a mistake when it is clear that I have. But until then I'll stick to my thoughts on the subject and defend them. Hopefully even expand them as has happened here.
In talking with Headly I was moved to research in to aspects of the story I had not researched before and I found a lot of good and new information which is still being processed. But sp far I haven't seen anything to change my mind about the fact that the Jewish stories are Sumerian stories reworked. In fact I have been able to confirm that idea with new evidence.
The seven day thing may have been a question of bad memory as I didn't look up the passage I was thinking of before I posted.
But you seem to constantly accuse people of not discussing properly and not being honest. That's all, in fact, you seem to want to do, at least from my own experience talking to you.
Or perhaps you are not really clear on how forums work?
Perhaps it would be better for you to make your own case and ignore what you think is outrageous or a ploy or tactic?
Just a friendly suggestion.My apologies then, as I didn't see the part where you made a mistake, and saw the contradiction and asked. If you noticed, I did say that I likely have done the same, and even said later, that if it was a joke (I didn't know), then my apologies. This is a rather interesting response to all that. I do understand this is discussion and debate, though I wonder if all think that because of what I observe here so often.
I do want my ideas raked over the coals, but not with tactics, untruths, etc. Just with legitimate reason and facts. The very thing in question here hinders this idea. That is, that you are taking issue with how I conduct myself here, and say I seem to constantly accuse people of this and that. Well IF someone is not being honest, then we can no longer debate, right? We all want to debate and discuss I thought.
To be clear, that is not at all, all I want to do. I love discussing good ideas and reading other's posts. If you pull out tactics that lend unfair advantage, or fib a lot, or say I said things I never said, then that will be a problem. In fact, if anyone does that in a debate, I would expect no less from them for myself. I am not asking others to do for me what I won't first do for myself or the group, or anyone.
I am sorry you are wondering that am not sure how forums work. However, do you really suggest I ignore the behavior that actually stifles and prohibits good debate? Do you see the irony there?
I have shared a lot of my own ideas that have been shot down and been mocked over the years. Before I got to HubPages I did it also, and have seen the same dishonest tactics many times over. When I say dishonest, there are times its not with others, but it seems people are doing it to themselves, intellectually. They hold on very tightly to ideas that don't have good reasons for supporting them.
To those that act outrageous, use ploys or tactics or are dishonest, I imagine they would want me to ignore all those things, then share my own ideas. LOL, sorry, that strikes me as the funniest thing I have heard in a long time. Before you think me too rude, consider what you just said. I share my ideas or make a case, then when/if it is met with outrageous behavior, ploys or tactics or dishonesty, I just ignore that part. Its the "auto win" thing again.
So is your suggestion really a friendly one?
As for ideas or making a case, I believe in God, Jesus, and esteem logic, reason, truth, facts, science, history, and all kinds of things. Some ideas I have supported and spoken on lately include that I think our bodies are a miracle, how I think Intelligent design wins out over materialism when it comes to origins, how I think its wise to read books as the authors intended them to be read, and more. Those are just a few that come to mind. My views aren't secret, like Mr. Lamb says.
One thing we have in common, is to debate and discuss here. I am sorry you think that my pointing out the things in question are not for these forums. Sorry this is getting so long, but here is my philosophy on debate in a very small nutshell:
We all hold views on all kinds of things, and they are generally good or bad views. I also believe that the nature of truth is such that not all can be right, so some are holding onto poor views for whatever reasons they are. When in debate groups like this, good views hold their own with no tactics or truth twisting or denying needed. Poor views, held onto tightly, don't have much to fall back on, and I think SOMETIMES, this is when tactics come into play, for obvious reasons. If there were good reasons to support views, and I mean logical, reasonable and factual reasons, then no tactics or ploys are necessary and the views suffice. Its much less exhausting to just choose a good view, and I believe this firmly.
My biggest request of people here would be to fairly go after me, let it be that I said something worth going after, lol. Challenge what I say. If i have not said enough, then I am sorry for that, but I am not sure that is the case. I am a Christian, but don't assume about me, like I won't about you as an atheist. I really don't. I don't ever just say stuff or deny stuff either. I always give my reasoning, thus the long posts sometimes. I hope this helps to know where I am coming from. I am not trying to be a jerk. I want things to be fair, and I ACTUALLY think its best for all of us, to be more careful and fair in our debate, and we wlll enjoy it more. If i have the worse views, then it will be harder for me. I think this too if the other guy has the lacking views. That is a tougher road to defend and it can get exhausting. I mean genuinely defend. Hope that helps.You have just provided the reasons why your ideas get shot down and mocked, they don't follow logic, reason, truth facts, science, etc., and when you say they do, people are going to laugh. Your ideas are based entirely on faith and beliefs, not facts and evidence.
I felt compelled to comment briefly on your assertion that the biblical stories are reworked from other traditions. It could simply be not so much reworked as a different perspective. I find it interesting that we have stories of similar events documented (?) by ancient cultures yet our first instinct is to attempt to deny the event. I suppose that can be chalked up to the fact that if we believed the event to be real we would have to choose a story to believe. But, would we? The ancients apparently felt free to interpret as they saw fit.
Possibly. But I can only go by the text and what it says, and compare it to the history of the region. All I know for sure is that whatever happened in this timeframe brought a burgeoning culture of 1500+ years to an abrupt end, and was at least partially due to a flood about 4000BC. But I also know the numbers given in these texts, like the use of 40 and 400 to explain long periods of time (flood rains 40 days/nights, 40 years in the wilderness, 400 years between Abraham and Moses) weren't always 40 or 400, but rather used to explain long periods of time. I'm totally open to the possibility that some things could have been exaggerated or lost in translation at some point. That's why I try to ground these stories in the history of the region. To better make sense out of what's what. But what's clear is that events very much like what's described did actually happen, and did actually have the impact that's described. It's these events, in fact, that appear to have played an integral role in the beginnings of the modern human world.
But I'm not going to rule things out as impossible just because it may seem so to some. There are things people of these ancient civilizations accomplished that we're still not sure how they did it. There are walls constructed where each brick weighs more than what even the most powerful modern tools can life, that were transported great distances and neatly stacked atop one another. If we had only read about the great pyramid of Giza, but had never actually seen it if it weren't still standing, I'm sure there'd be people who'd balk at that being possible as well. Doesn't make it true.Where do you get this stuff? So now the stories don't even have to make sense to be real. "There are walls constructed where each brick weighs more than what even the most powerful modern tools can lift" What?
What you seem to be saying is I'm going to believe this no matter what. It can make no sense and I'll even make stuff up to back up my claims like that the mind cannot be detected or measured or that these people did construction that modern day cannot or that 4000 years ago one guy built a boat made entirely of wood (had to cut it all by hand himself) the size of a small cruise ship and took it to sea for year full of animals rather than simply leaving the area.
Time to rethink?It is indeed time for you to rethink, Dr. Lamb. Like think about telling us where you get your information and opinions from. It does not matter whether we agree or disagree with your opinions, you are free to state them regardless. But if you want us to give you credibility for those opinions, let's have your credentials before us.
Headly.. and Slarty.. at least give some interesting and well-thought-out arguments.So it's a good augment that 4000 years ago one guy cut down trees and cut the trees to assemble, fastened and build a boat the size of a small modern day cruise ship that could house the local animals for a year in a local flood that lasted a year while during that that time they never saw land nor did any of the birds aboard? When God could have simply instructed these people and animals to leave the area as he intends to Murder everything in site?
This to you make sense from a caring loving God or a reasonable human being?I have I no need to, or intention to enter the discussion, or to agree/disagree for the moment. All you seem to have done so far is criticize their points of view, anonymously and harshly.
Yes, I can see that the sort of questions you ask are valid ones, but there is no need to insult those people who make the apparently silly argument, without questioning and finding out why they have that view.
By way of example, The "Irish joke" has for a long time been seen as the funniest dig at the Irish people. The jokes poke at the illogical, yet as illogical as an Irish person's point of view might be, if we ask more deeply we can often discover their logic which is not so weird after all..... they have a lot of good sense.
Headly's reason for believing what he does has been explained several times before. Regardless whether I agree with him, I can respect his reasoning. If you read some of his recent posts, you will get my meaning (maybe!).
Slarty's views I see as coming from atheist thinking, somewhat like my own. (And probably very much like your own), but there is no need for me to "side" with him. I think for myself and allow others to do the same, mostly without belittling them.I don't think disagreeing with him is insulting him and if you check back you'll see that he did agree that building a boat for a local flood rather than tell the people and animals to just leave is a very good point and one worth thinking about. I've read what he has said and I understand why he thinks the way he does, and I give him my full respect, but I'm allowed to attempt to show him the flaws in his story.
Johnny, It is refreshing to see this approach when it is chosen over some others, and I appreciate that. I wish more people did this with each other.
Here is the time when I'm reminding you that you are giving the thumbs up to someone who attempted to sensor someone else for giving there opinion. I was not as jonny said being harsh and blindly critiquing the two of them. I as asking Headly some question that he himself admited were good questions and you come along and give him a pat on the back for that after you question someone for agreeing with someone else a few pages back. Can you show me were I was rude and disruptive to anyone here?
Things like Pyramids of Giza, and the facts that go along with that, even if it wasn't observable, I imagine would draw the same kind of over the top skepticism to allow it to even be true. But its a good point all the same. Seemingly impossible things WERE accomplished, and the ideas of those things are not at all met with the same kind of opposition and skepticism. That ought to tell us something right there.
They thought they were the world. That seems easy enough. That in itself suggests it was a regional food. Besides which there is zero evidence for a world wide flood. None at all. Zip. Ziltch. nada.
Lots of floods in the region of the bible though. More than one. Many. And perhaps a really big one 13000 years ago when the earths pole shifted and ice caps melted.
But the boat Noah built would have sunk the minute it hit water. The timbers would have bent and shifted with the weight and it would never have survived even a pleasant day out never mind a storm as described by the bible. To make a boat that big you have to strap it with iron at least. No mention of that in the bible or elsewhere.
The boat of the bible is impossible, just like most of the rest of that story. .Exactly, but that doesn't stop believers who argue about it.
I know, and I've argued with them on this point almost as much as I've argued with you, which is a lot.
What you fail to understand is that without that metal structure and with only 4000 year old technology and one guy to build it, not only would it have not gotten built, but it wouldn't have held together.
We know the metal structure wasn't required because large boats built to not just float, but be steered and navigated, not just for one shot, but for continued use for many years, can and have been built of wood and do work. The Greeks and Romans were quite good at building large boats of wood. As were others. Granted, this would be an enormous task for Noah and his sons, but not impossible.
Impossible in the time given, for sure. 7 days. That's another aspect of the story that is impossible.
Seven days? The story does not specify the length of time Noah had to build the ark. It only says the flood waters came when Noah was 600. Keep in mind also that these people, as it specifies in Gen6, are not 'mortal humans'. According to the Sumerians Gilgamesh was a demi-god because his mother was a goddess, as many of the mythologies of the region speak of, and that he had super human strength as it says he is the one that erected the great walls of Uruk. In the context of the story Noah and everyone 'of Eve' lived extremely long lives and were not merely mortal humans. So it's entirely possible we're not exactly comparing apples to apples here. When your architect is God, and your builders are something more than human, a lot may be possible that wouldn't seem to be the case for mere mortals.
Probably thinking of the Sumerian version then.
"And the waters prevailed exceedingly upon the earth; and all the high mountains that were under the whole heaven were covered. 20 Fifteen cubits upward did the waters prevail; and the mountains were covered."
15 cubits and the mountains were covered? What? 15 cubits is 22.5 feet. And the mountains were covered? Not likely. Oh but now you will tell me about how mountains were no more than 20 feet high before the flood?No, but I will tell you that the same word translated as 'mountains' by the translators who assumed a global flood is translated elsewhere as 'hills'. How many mountains do you know of exist in this region? You have to travel pretty far east before you reach any actual mountains.
So it did not cover the earth or all the mountains? We might agree on something yet. But my translation is from the Torah, not the bible
The first five books of the bible are translated from the Torah too. But it's still a Hebrew to English translation, and still has the same issues. You have to understand that for many centuries those who read/translated these texts, Jews and Gentiles, had no frame of reference. They didn't have the information we do now. So they translated as accurately as they could, but that still calls for understanding proper context to get it right. Without proper context there's a lot of assumptions that have to be made in choosing what wording best represents the original Hebrew. Even if you're fluent in Hebrew, without context there are many words that could mean one thing in one context and something else in another. Like 'hills/mountains', 'day/age', 'land/earth'.
So you agree it was not a global flood? Or not?
I do agree. Science shows us there was never a global flood, but I also recognize that bronze age people would have no way of knowing whether the flood they experienced was global or not. If it engulfed all the land from their perspective, to them that is all the world. It's people in the centuries since who thought it was describing a global flood because the way it's described it's all the world they knew. Most throughout the ages didn't have the information to know better.
Just one more example of scriptures being wrong because, "bronze age people would have no way of knowing... didn't have the information to know better."
We may be witnessing here the only religious fanatic in the world who's an atheist.
However, the discussion between Slarty and Heady has been interesting to follow.
Two people, each being very knowledgable in their subject, yet sharing different points of view - often strongly held but respectfully so. Please keep it that way.
It is not necessary to be right all the time and it's not wrong to be wrong some of the time.
These are the same bronze age people who were capable of knowing how the Universe came into existence, had super human abilities, spoke with god and lived to be 900 years old?
In the context of the story God directly interacted with Adam/Eve/Cain/Abel/Enoch early on, but quit long before the flood. So it would make sense that they could have insights into creation, but still a very human perspective of the flood.
This must be a strange new meaning of the words "make sense" that I am unfamiliar with. Why would they need a human perspective after being warned by god and having the ability to tame wild animals?
You sure you are not an atheist here to show how ridiculous this story is? Because we already know.Why would God need to tell Noah anything more than, "Hey, a flood's coming, you need to build a boat." What good would it have done Noah for God to continue on by saying, "... and when I mean the whole world I mean the whole planet. See the earth beneath your feet is actually a sphere floating in space."
It seems this explanation more conflicts with your own assumptions than on any sort of logical take on the material. Clearly you don't pay the material much mind or give it the respect or attention one would need to carefully consider and analyze, so your criticisms are understandable. Like many others you've obviously made up your mind about what these texts actually are.
Besides, what's ridiculous? The universe is ridiculous. The entirety of existence inflating out from a single origin point and becoming all we know now. That's ridiculous. Doesn't mean it isn't true. We humans being the product of millions of years of evolution, gradually evolving from simple single-celled organisms to complex multi-celled bipeds with opposable thumbs and reason/intelligence/self-awareness is ridiculous. Doesn't mean it isn't true. It's usually those who define what is and isn't possible prematurely, with no grounds on which to base those definitions, who end up hindering themselves by their own self-imposed limitations. If everyone thought like that we wouldn't know half of what we do now.
It's important to keep an open mind because if we've learned anything to this point it should be that the explanation for how we're here just keeps getting more and more ridiculous.Nothing science proposes is ridiculous. Your story? Ridiculous. Sorry. Open your mind and you will see.
As much as jonny doesn't want me picking on you I'm going to do it anyway.
You are attempting to use logic to explain why God would tell Noah to build a boat by himself (which involves cutting down trees and cutting up the trees without current technology) for a local flood that he simply could have walked away from and not give him any more knowledge of his environment "Hey, a flood's coming, you need to build a boat."? You've decided the story most be a local flood because we have no evidence of a global flood but failed to make sense of the story in regards to a local flood. "Hey, a flood's coming, you need to get to high ground."I don't mind the questions. Half the reason I even speak to others about any of this is to test myself and my ideas. I can see no flaws, but that doesn't mean there aren't any. I'm just as human and just as fallible as everyone else. If there's something I believe that is demonstrably wrong, I want to know about it and correct the problem because truth and understanding are always my ultimate goal.
I don't know how much of this thread you've followed, but the below two comments are where I laid out some of the details that take my thinking in this direction ...
http://hubpages.com/forum/post/2544968 - set against actual history
http://hubpages.com/forum/post/2545538 - set against mythological history
There's a lot there, though even that is just the tip of the iceberg, but I hope that's enough to show you why I feel there is significant reason to think I'm on the right track. It's the explanation that makes the most sense to me and that best explains what can be observed. It's one relatively simple explanation that lines up scientifically, historically, even mythologically, and it makes the narrative of the bible one cohesive story from beginning to end. But what I've found to be most significant are the predictions this hypothesis has accurately made. For example, I knew nothing about the Sumerians before I formed this hypothesis and I knew nothing about the dramatic behavioral change in our human history. Both of these I found through testing predictions if this hypothesis is true.
So, I say all of that to say this. I've been milling over your question about the flood and why God wouldn't just tell them to get to higher ground. In my view this is a small piece of a much bigger puzzle that has a lot of pieces that have snapped right into place, so it only stands to reason this one will as well. So, while I can only really speculate as far as God's reasoning or motivations, this is not something I'm looking to rationalize just because I really want it to be true. I think it's true because of the evidence surrounding it. Determining 'if' something is true is actually easier than determining 'why'. But here's my thoughts on it.
The placement of these stories seems to be very deliberate. The geographical layout of Mesopotamia seems to be the perfect place to first introduce what could very well prove to be a volatile element. Much in the same way a scientist testing a dangerous or hazardous material would take precautions, I see this as much the same thing. Keeping this rapidly spreading element within this region I think was important so that something could be done if it went bad, much like the story says it did. So, telling Noah that this flood would only cover this plain could well have caused the problem to spread, making it much more difficult to manage. For God to tell Noah that He's going to destroy all the land and everyone on it, and telling him to build a boat to survive, there seems to be no other alternative. Where, if He had told Noah to head for higher ground, Noah may have felt compelled to warn others, or others seeing one of these immortal beings and his family high-tailing it out of the region may have prompted them to follow.
Part of this explanation is based on the story in Numbers regarding the Nephilim. Genesis describes these beings as being the off-spring between the immortal descendants of Adam and mortal humans. Genesis says, during its explanation for why the flood was necessary, that these beings were "on the earth in those days (before the flood), and also after". Later, in Numbers 13, long after Abraham, after their enslavement in Egypt, while wondering in the wilderness, the first place God sends Moses and the Israelite tribes is to Hebron where they are supposed to take that land and take out its inhabitants. When the Israelite spies go into Hebron to see what they're dealing with, they say they saw three descendants of Anak, who it says is a descendant of the Nephilim. These beings are described as quite large compared to the Israelites, which of course strikes fear and doubt in them.
While there is no other mention of the Nephilim, there are numerous mentions of 'Anakites', as they and others play a prominent role through much more of the story. And in each of these, they are described as very large and formidable....
Deuteronomy 1:28 - Where can we go? Our brothers have made our hearts melt in fear. They say, ‘The people are stronger and taller than we are; the cities are large, with walls up to the sky. We even saw the Anakites there.’”
Deuteronomy 2:10 - The Emites used to live there—a people strong and numerous, and as tall as the Anakites.
Deuteronomy 2:21 - They were a people strong and numerous, and as tall as the Anakites. The Lord destroyed them from before the Ammonites, who drove them out and settled in their place.
Deuteronomy 9:2 - The people are strong and tall—Anakites! You know about them and have heard it said: “Who can stand up against the Anakites?”
So I read this to mean these were unintended bi-products that started before the flood, as a big part of the Israelite story is in dealing with these beings. The Israelites were basically tasked with finishing the job the flood was meant for. I think of this as a possible threat to the balanced world God was trying to create. When He 'started over' at the flood, the story makes it clear that there were survivors, which strongly argues against a global flood. If beings like this really existed, based on how they're described, if they had not been dealt with in this way then they most likely would have ended up becoming the dominant species. So, the way the flood was handled, in light of the rest of the story, could very well have been to maximize the impact of the flood and to minimize the bleed-over into the new world God was working to create.I take this to mean you will make it fit as it only stand to reason, so rather than working like science does, to find falsehoods in a theory, you are attempting to reason your theory as being correct.
So Noah spending years building a giant boat doesn't cause concern, but him walking away does? "Where you going Noah?" "I'm out of here" "Going to visit someone". While a guys cutting down every tree and building a boat is business as usual.
Actually, he had been making the case for what the results would be after a local flood, for many days by this point.
I know he's been attempting to make the case for a local flood, so I'm pointing out that spending years building a boat in the middle of dry land rather than simply walking away makes no sense at all.
And if you want to talk about a land that is pretty much forest free.......
Ah, then we get into the question of dead weight tonnage, water displacement, and cargo capacity. The ark, in the biblical descriptions, was not built like a cargo ship. In addition it was wood. The kind of wood doesn't really matter for this, unless it was some sort of magical wood. Wooden ships simply cannot hold the same amount of DWT as modern cargo ships. Going on the measurements of the Ark, however, and making the outstandingly unrealistic assumption that it would have equivalent cargo capacity to a modern ship of it's same size, it could carry- at most- 60,000 dead weight tonnes.
Now, keep in mind, as well, that is DEAD WEIGHT tonnage. Moving cargo acts differently. It requires far less tonnage of moving cargo to swamp a ship. But we'll ignore that as well.
Granted, that sounds like quite a bit of tonnage. It's not really. Not when you consider the tonnage of two of each animal AND it's food. A very conservative estimate (VERY) is that each animal is going to eat 5% of it's body weight in food each day. I do say conservative there because the weight of two elephants food for a year ALONE would be between 132 and 198 metric tonnes. The food for a pair of tigers, between 10 and 13 tonnes. I could go on, but you can see my point by now.
The ark itself might float (unlikely) but filled with animals and food? Not happening.If we're talking about all the animals in existence at that time, I think you're right. But if we're only talking about two of each animal indigenous to southern Mesopotamia, which I don't believe included elephants (though I could be wrong about that), then that's a much different story.
Sounds like the one we can observe would have been a lot heavier then. Helps the other case more, far as I see it. I could be wrong, but the metal hulls, then adding pine to that.... Heavy if the idea is the other couldn't float without all that extra metal, yet this one did.
Building ships does not require so much looking at their weight as it does looking at buoyancy and strength. When ships get large, wood can still hold to buoyancy factors, but no so much strength. That's why steel is used, instead.
"Instead, Huibers and his team built the boat by welding together the metal hulls of 25 barges into a single frame, which was then covered with Scandinavian pine. Weighing about 3,000 tons, the boat contains sleeping quarters, a theater, restaurant and conference facilities to seat 1,500 people."
I was unaware that Noah welded together the metal hulls of 25 barges into a single frame and then covered it with Scandinavian pine.I've addressed that twice now. Please see previous comments.
What Headly's saying is that this is an over exaggeration, and that it was only hills, and that they couldn't see all the land, etc. Although, if the land hadn't been separated yet, I'm assuming, and only Noah and the animals in the boat survived, it had to cover all of the land. Maybe it was somehow lowered so that the waters could rise over it? Or maybe the glaciers magically unmelted and then refroze? It's super sketchy...
Why take all the animals if it isn't a global flood? If the animals could listen to reason and board a boat they could have been told to exist the area. Seems to me no matter how this story is interpreted it makes no sense.
That's actually a really good point. Being regional it wouldn't be nearly the number of animals that most think, but I can see your point that if God could have the animals board an ark he could have just as well had them travel out of range. I could only really guess what the reasoning may be there.
Understand, I'm using actual history to try to establish context, but can only guess as to God's intentions. I think there's ample evidence to show these stories are explaining events that match up with the data we have. And not just randomly chosen events, but events that played a key role in the onset of the human world as we know it today. Whether you believe the 'God' aspect of the story or not, I think it's clear these events are much more based in actual history than most read it to be. So I'm trying to address questions from that viewpoint. But that is a really good point.Further, why not just have Noah and all the animals he doesn't want dead to simply leave the area? The fact that as the story goes he needed a boat suggests that it was not a global flood. If it was a global flood and he only took two of all the local animals that appear no where else the wouldn't the surviving animals display the same genetic problems that chetahs do only much worse?
I can only go by the facts. The facts show that this region of the world had a burgeoning culture that lasted over 1500 years, and then ended abruptly. Both the Genesis account and the Sumerian account say that this is due to a very large flood that happened not long before the city state of Uruk was built, which was actually first built around 3800BC. Both the Genesis account and the Sumerian account say a man was warned ahead of time, built a boat, and took a handful of people and a bunch of animals. So, according to the descendants of those who actually lived back then, that's what happened. And the evidence does show that something of this scale must have as it brought an abrupt end, not only to that long-standing culture, but to any human presence in that region for an extended period of time ...
"The archaeological record shows that Arabian Bifacial/Ubaid period came to an abrupt end in eastern Arabia and the Oman peninsula at 3800 BC, just after the phase of lake lowering and onset of dune reactivation.[8] At this time, increased aridity led to an end in semi-desert nomadism, and there is no evidence of human presence in the area for approximately 1000 years, the so-called "Dark Millennium".[9] This might be due to the 5.9 kiloyear event at the end of the Older Peron." - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ubaid_period
Hi!!!
This conversation got so scientifical. Not my spin... but reason and logic are evident within the confines of your conversation, in my opinion.
It seems necessary to plant words and ideas into your message to make it look as incompetent as the opposition wishes in an effort to look smarter. I have seen it many times.
What do you mean your patience is lacking???
You have been well-prepared. It shows.Hi Genaea
, How have you been?
Aww, thanks so much for that. I appreciate it. Hope you are doing well.Doing well as I can. Thanks!
It had to be said. Your stick-to-it-iveness has been nice. The ideas of carnal rain down like hot fiery coals of bitter hatred; and the children of God sprinkle their salt. And the fire doesn't even leave the smell of smoke. even the main points are ignored for minor tidbits of word-picking. It is more evidence of spirit to me.
SHINE!
But, it is obvious you're not siding with reason and logic, you're siding with myth and superstition; creationism.
Well, its not obvious, because we don't know what you mean exactly by creationism there. What do you take that to mean exactly.
Then I can most fairly respond. With what I HAVE said to you so far, can you find anything unreasonable or illogical? That would be the second question that needs to be answered, then we can carry on.Uh, what is says in scriptures, obviously. Or, the latest attempt at creationism; Intelligent Design.
It's interesting that you claim that to not believe in God unreasonable and illogical, yet when we explain why it's the other way around you act like you haven't heard it.
That is a false statement. You would have to show that to be true, for it to be true.
I think belief in God IS still reasonable and logical. You don't get that its the "explanations of why" that we disagree on? We are spending a TON of time making the better cases, why. The showing of your "whys", as being illogical should matter to you. This is what I do when I have time to post here. Point by point. With respect, I can't use your own reasoning, for me to ditch what are reasonable and logical reasons for coming to my belief in him. Insisted upon reasoning, forced definitions as we are seeing, don't work. What is actual, works though, and happy to discuss those things. Focus on where the disconnect is, what these things are hinging on. If you are unwilling, we will get nowhere, which is often what is observed, unfortunately. Willing to discuss particular points, though, and we almost kind of are.
We weren't even talking about creationism though. We were talking about the idea that if an author like Rowling writes a fiction book, and called it such, doesn't MEAN that there aren't any other books on history, or the other genres mentioned. (Those were poetry, history, prophecy, .letters, etc. In the bible.) I was having to make that case. So yes, I was siding with logic and reason, but DO welcome you to point out to me any time I am not, because I don't want to side against those things. I would appreciate it.
An ancient people attempt to convince themselves that they are descendant of fallen Gods and there God have given them the right to land, slaves and riches guilt free, you some still by into it. If you were to for a second to step back and look at the stories as new you see them for what they are. There is evidence for an old universe and a cruel earth that has evolved without us as a purpose and there is no evidence a any global flood 4000 years ago that lasted a year.
Good books of fiction are only labeled fiction on the outside. This wan't done 4000 years ago.My views include an older universe, and an earth that did its share of evolving, as we see. I haven't been convinced of the world wide flood, but can understand the writers of that event writing from their point of view, and it sure looked world wide to them. I take all these things into consideration. You seem to think I hold other views than I do, so that is why I share that.
The ancient Israelites by the way, were an unlikely group (for many reasons) to have survived like they did. Their story and how it comes to us, would make sense of a God trying to show himself to humanity through a particular group, initially. This is why the word spread across the land, as people were very surprised. I don't really ever know what you mean about the fallen gods, as I don't read that in the Old Testament. Where is it so I can read about it?
You can't say a book is fiction, and it be actually fiction, for that reason alone. It has to actually be fiction, to be fiction. Your assertion hasn't been established, and I can appreciate you have an opinion and assertion though. A book is fiction or not, regardless of what is on its "spine."Okay fair enough,
The story says that Adam and Eve would created, but Gods hands and intended to live forever, but because they consumed knowledge he took that away from them. Fallen Gods.
Is it not fiction to state the universe was created in six days a few thousand years ago?
Is it not fiction to state there was a global flood that lasted a year 4000 years ago. Or even still is it not fiction to state that these people drifted in a boat for a year with every known creature aboard in a boat that couldn't have floated without ever seeing land in a local flood?I have never once read Genesis to mean that Adam and Eve were fallen gods. It doesn't read like that they were gods, never says it. It was always one god. It doesn't say that the earth was created 6 thousand years ago, either, if you go back and look.
This was in response to saying there can't be anything known about God, and that he is hiding, etc. The mention of a book, is that it actually IS laid out, and the point was made, proving the other wrong.
That brought upon this statement, which has turned into the completely goofball argument going on now, which is telling. (About the Harry Potter books.)
It is simply amazing to me. You can give great answers showing and proving how another is so obviously wrong in an obviously wrong statement that was made in the first place. Whats strange, is not only the non acknowledgement of all the great answers given, PLUS reasoning ,but then you get this wayward and pointless stuff that comes up, as if it is buffetting the side making the pointless arguments, that missed the initial points.
I am not complaining so much (though its pretty painful), as struggling to justify spending another moment on such. I mention it also in case the people engaging in such might realize what they are doing. No one can be this bored, that this is personal entertainment or something, right? Then you get the laughter and mocking, as if that is something too...
Just thinking out loud here, but perhaps my time is better spent responding to those that don't take good points and trample them under foot, so to speak...... Wasting all of our time.Sure, it's a goofball argument, since you nor anyone else can actually distinguish any reality between your religion and those books.
Sounds more like you're just upset that your religion has been equated to other equally absurd fantasies.Aw ocean, we're just having some fun.
Ok. So here's what we know about the Harry Potter series.
Harry Potter:
-It's current within the past approx. 15 years.
-We know who wrote it.
-We know it's fiction.
-We live in a time where we know that there is no such thing as Hogwarts, or house elves.
-It talks about a world where magic and the mundane are unaware of each other.
-Harry Potter is the only one that can kill Lord Voldemort.
-There are lots of fun spells (that don't actually work, unfortunately)
-There exist giants and all kinds of magical creatures.
-There are many life lessons, and many unpleasant happenings.
-It seems everyone thinks that Harry's the way out of their unfortunate dealings with Voldemort because of the prophecy.
-A LOT of people die.
-Harry Potter dies and comes back to life.
The difference between that and religious scripture in general:
-No mention of the origination of life
-No mention of God(s)
-No mention of readers applying the lessons.
-No mention of the readers desperate need to apply the lessons to get into Heaven and escape Hell, or to reach nirvana and escape reincarnation, etc, etc.
Now what if someone comes along and decides they want to rewrite Harry Potter as a religious book? And enough people collaborate to make it sound as plausible as possible. And all the things listed under differences are accounted for. Imagine the internet goes down and people lose all methods of nearly instant communication. There is no modern technology. It's the dark ages. Imagine the book was only known regionally, and the people that decided to make it into a religious book started calling themselves Potterians. The people around them are familiar with it's original context. Other people in other regions don't know about Harry Potter. Over the expanse of about 2,000 years, the Potterian message is spread. Forced upon many. And it takes hold because of all the sparkly stuff they put in it and because people are desperate for hope. And you'll only ever experience magic when your faith is strong enough in Potter.
Fast forward 2,000 years. English has died off/evolved. All they have are their best translations based off of manuscripts deemed reliable by special Potterians.
"Worship Potter lest you burn in Hell with Voldemort!!!!"
People start "finding" old elf bones.
People claim they've seen Hogwarts' ruins.
People swear they've experienced used magic and you can only do it if you truly accept Potter.
People go to services to worship Potter.
People see Potter in toast.
Etc, etc.
Without the technology to really prove otherwise, no one will be able to know how it all came about. Especially if the more obviously fiction versions are burned/lost. Could Potter be our salvation?I am genuinely curious from you, what do you think was well done here?
By the way, I have this same question for so many others, but usually don't ask the actual question, lol. I see this often, "good point", when I, even stepping outside of the convos and try to look back in, can't see. So I am not trying to single you out. or anything. I am genuinely curious.... Did you mean make the point that answered her "what if" scenario she created, that she then answered?Ok, point taken. I was impressed by having a new "take" in the discussion.... I had not thought of this comparison between the bible and harry potter.....it appeals to me.
The actual argument that is going on, I find lots of lots of writing too much to read through, especially as many of fellow hubbers are in the United States, opposite in time to myself. So much has been written during the time I am asleep, so it's not possible to joint the conversation as it's happening.
Also, several of the commentators here in these discussions are so much more knowledgeable and better at conversation than myself, so I tend to step back out of the argument, most of the time. Sometimes my comments can be irrelevant, but I still feel empowered to make them.I can understand that, and I hope you make more comments in the future. I was just curious, and thanks for answering.
I'll have to remind you of this the next time you give the thumbs up to another.
Do. I will be happy to share why I gave it. I will lay it out in great detail even, lol. I was genuinely curious.
My point in bringing up any of it, was that the original bringing up of Harry Potter was to miss a point and change the direction of a poor argument that was had shown to be false/refuted.
That is has morphed into what it has, and that it is impressive in the way it is to anyone, makes the point I am making/observing.
Simply put, there is a great delusion going on that people think are making some good arguments, that really aren't even addressing the points, especially when they were just defeated in the argument. This impressive and even hilarious to some! It is kind of sad and pathetic to others that see it for what it is. Sadly, without the ones that are making the great arguments, there would be no one to mock and give the others the false "wins," they seem to love so much. So, the running off of those that bring you the fun, may not be the best method? Many have disappeared, and good for them. And to add, no, not all do the behavior I am observing, but those that do, do.
Then we see the high fives, laughter, mocking, way to go, excellent points, etc! Woohooo! You get the idea...... I now expect someone in particular to come and weigh in on this, lol. Have fun.Sorry Oceans, we are simply attempting to demonstrate that fiction is not written as fiction. Harry Potter is written as things that took place with magical creatures, with magical events and people. The writer intends to make you think these things are possible. There is no attempt to mock. I don't mean any disrespect and I'm sure others are the same. I believe it was your claim that fiction books are written as fiction, I'm simple pointing out they are not.
Well, while not going back to the original point, my point (at that point) was to read books as the author intends them to be read. (Always a good thing to do.) I think this is true of all the biblical books by the way, and I mentioned them before, as there are many different types of literature included there (which makes my point also..) Now people don't have to read books as they are intended to be read, and I did invite you to answer how or why Moses or whoever wrote the early books would engage in writing fiction for fun when clearly they included very real genealogies, etc. Which would have to be the case.. So while you can read a book of fiction and pretend its written as literal events, what point would that serve, and we know its obviously silly?
If we were talking about any other ancient historical set of events, and I said that the history book detailing them ought to be read as it was intended by the author, no one would ever say, "well since you mention the WORD "book", I have a book for you! How about Harry Potter, are we to believe that too?"
It didn't apply or make sense from the get go, yet is seen as a slam dunk. So some tried to help you bring it around so it looked like it did, perhaps. That was nice, and I am just addressing it didn't quite accomplish that, and was a little frustrated in general about how these forums seem to work, for people that are genuinely interested in debate. So thanks for that, and my apology for getting frustrated at my observations.I do get that the intention was different. One was intended to entertain and make money, while the other was intended to inspire a particular group of people for war. If you read the OT from that perspective you'll see it's true intent was not to teach humans how to behave, but to inspire one tribe to think they are descendants from fallen Gods.
If that is true and your point carries, then it is my hope that you don't pick up a book like Red Dragon by Thomas Harris, the story about Hannibal Lecter, (Silence of the Lambs, etc.) and mistakenly take it be a book about how to be the best neighbor. I mean since we can't know how books are written, especially when written like they are real. Even if you did mistakenly do a much less serious version of this, and started painting your neighbors fence white after reading Mark Twain's Tom Sawyer, I hope they would just understand since its so easy to mistake these books and how the writer intended them to be read. (This is part of the whole point, and this is to answer A Thousand words also, at least in part.)
Some might wonder at my sticking with this one rather than letting it go.... I point these things out to show how we aren't always mentally handling these topics fairly, and I think this is self deception which I am sure no one wants to do. (Myself included) If/when they do it, it is consistently with these kinds of topics that is a clue to ourselves, a red flag of sorts. Even with my frustration, I do care about people and that they might be doing this to themselves.Is it your intention to assert that I don't understand the difference between fiction and non-fiction? I understand your frustration when we show you the connections between Harry Potter and the bible, but that not reason to insult. I know fiction when I read it and when a story involves giants, entire earth floods, people who lived for almost a thousand years along with talking snakes I tend to think they are fiction. What about you?
Only based on this, and MANY of your other recent posts to me and others,
"I believe it was your claim that fiction books are written as fiction, I'm simple pointing out they are not."
You have been asserting it, not me, using Harry Potter as an example and how well its written, and how you wouldn't know.
I was hoping my example would hopefully awaken the senses some there. I think it did! So you DO know when a book is fiction and when it is not, which was my point all along. You were defending the opposite, but now you agree and I am so glad.
I agree with you that the argument was insufficient. It is because I understood what you seem to think was profoundly missing in particular from any fiction/fantasy books that are not written to teach the reader about religion/spirituality that I then wrote this. I addressed clearly the differences. This was my admitting that Harry Potter/fiction is indeed not the same as a Spiritual/religious book. What I offered to you was a way to reconcile that issue.
Bear with me, and thanks for your patience in advance, but can you explain this part more?
"It is because I understood what you seem to think was profoundly missing in particular from any fiction/fantasy books that are not written to teach the reader about religion/spirituality that I then wrote this. I addressed clearly the differences."
What do you think I seem to think was profoundly missing in particular? Just so I am clear.Well, I could be wrong, but I'll just post what I listed out in my earlier response.
"The difference between that and religious scripture in general:
-No mention of the origination of life
-No mention of God(s)
-No mention of readers applying the lessons.
-No mention of the readers desperate need to apply the lessons to get into Heaven and escape Hell, or to reach nirvana and escape reincarnation, etc, etc."
While this is clearly not a complete list, it addresses the vital differences between typical fiction and religious/spiritual writings.With respect, I saw that before, which is why I asked about the part where you were speaking of me and what I thought was missing from fiction/fantasy books, and I wondered how you would know that about me, etc. So thanks for the reprint, but I wanted to know more why you said that or how you could know that about me? You were maybe just assuming? This was just a whole new introduction into the argument but it mentioned me specifically so I didn't want to miss a point you were making about me if it was like it looked. I could have been mistaken. Anyway, thanks for sharing your own thoughts on what you think is different between religious and fiction literature.
It is probably fair to say you were just speaking in general I guess, when you mentioned me, and I will take it as such unless I missed anything else.I was speaking in general and I was also making an assumption. You kept telling Dr. Lamb and ED that their argument was insufficient, and yet I didn't see much of a thorough dig into why.
Were you not saying that typical fiction and religious/writings were different and have different purposes? I'm confused. What exactly did you mean? Why did you find their argument invalid?
Your paragraph with the "what If" scenario that you describe, is changing this defeated argument into a third argument now, or topic, which is fine, just as long as you know that is what is happening.
The point you bring up is actually an interesting one, and I have often talked about how interesting it is, that so many people from all walks of life, sing, write and create movies around this sometimes very similar theme.
It is as if it something is struck deeper in all of us, a chord almost, and the theme you show similarities in can be made with many different stories/movies since they began. This so me is just a very interesting observation in humanity, many of which are not believers of any stripe, yet the ideas themselves are so beloved and play out over and over that it can't be missed. We could do the same with any number of other movies.
And yet you seem to have no argument. The point is that fiction is not written as fiction, we however need to look critically at it to understand that it's fiction. For example, we know dragons don't exist, but as the story describes there is reason why we muggles can't see the magical. The magical is supposedly directly in front of us yet we can't see it. The bible gives an exact same reason why we can't see God and yet it makes perfect sense to some because you are caught up in the story. Step back and look at the stories critically and one would do if attempting to determine if Harry Potter is factual and you may see the stories as fictitious, with giants, gods, fallen gods, people who live hundreds of years and giant wooden boats that house every know animal, insect and bird.
Going even further back, this was the post before the one I brought up earlier by Dr. Lamb or Radman. About the book.....
The point has been so missed.I don't see your point. So what there is a book? If that was your point then the Harry Potter spinoff makes perfect sense, There is a book about Harry Potter, but that doesn't make him real other than in our imaginations. There is also the Quran, does that mean that Christianity got the whole Jesus thing wrong?
The point is that spiritual/religious books are written with specific purposes. They are written to try to get a handle on the world. They speak of origins, god(s), salvation/enlightenment, and they tell a story that's meant to be applied personally instead of being read simply as a story. That is the difference it seems ocean's having trouble saying plainly.
Everyone's speaking a different language here.
To you, because it's ancient and fictitious, you see no difference.
But to ocean, it is a message meant for the readers, and there's a big difference.I think all books are meant to be read how the author intended for the readers of the book. I don't ever think there is a case where that rule doesn't apply. On another day in some other place, I truly think everyone here would normally agree with that.
We don't read Newsweek AS a romance novel, we don't read a How to Book on Plumbing, AS latest breaking news, etc. That was part of my point. This isn't just a Christian idea I am proposing its just logical. So I differ with what you say there, in that regard. Its not just a Dr. Lamb vs. Ocean way way of viewing the same piece of literature, though that explains SOME of the issue here I think.
As far as being applied personally, I am really good about trying to not do that, like many do. I mean how many people look at particular promises in the bible given, say to the Israelites living at a particular time in their history, and claim them for themselves, when they really should not. It doesn't ALL apply. A lot of it is their history.
Maybe not 101% of all books ever, but almost all books, ARE meant to be read as they writer intends it to be read. There are ways to know that if the word "fiction" isn't on the spine or inside the dust cover somewhere. We are not that stupid, or I hope not.Actually, that's what I said in my response to you...
"While this is clearly not a complete list, it addresses the vital differences between typical fiction and religious/spiritual writings."
What you said only makes sense. Which is the point... Only you were not originally explaining yourself well.
But you and Dr. Lamb were still speaking two different languages.
If one person is thinking collectively "fiction" regardless of the genre, whether they talk in first or third, whether it's a romance novel or murder mystery, if it is religious (and included in fiction if one does not believe it is truth), one will compartmentalize ALL fiction as being as fictitious as other fiction.
You are looking at the fiction separately, accentuating the fact that romance should be read differently than murder mysteries which are different from whatever else and were written for different purposes and so should be approached differently. You see spiritual books differently and with different purposes? No? You're not lumping them all together. He is.
Note: There are works of fiction that use real events and often even real people's name. That doesn't determine whether or not it is fiction.
I get that but there is confusion as to the specific purpose.
True. That's perspective for ya. How will we actually know what their intentions were? It's only speculation. It makes it much harder for it to be acceptable to question it when they throw in there that it's inspired by "Almighty God," that's for sure!! It perpetuates slave culture, IMO
It sure does, telling it's people who you can keep and how long you can keep them and even how to keep the if they want to go as well as how hard to beat them. I always enjoy reading how people justify the condoning of slavery in the OT.
Not just the overt kind of slavery but the covert slavery that exists now.
If by "we" you mean "I" then your pov is understandable, but it isn't as all-encompassing as you seem to think.
With science, logic, and some reasoning, its the most logical conclusion that a being with intellect, will and capability to cause all of this, did. This isn't just a theistic worldview, but a logical non-religious view. One need not be a Christian to come to a natural conclusion about an intelligent creator, or "originator" for lack of a better word. It seems the most honest thing to admit. The other ideas can't achieve it, and never could, and its not because they just haven't figured it out yet. Things would HAVE to be how they are NOT, in our observable universe for that to be true.
It doesn't make sense to me that it is made up by humans to explain it, when people could be just going along fine without any God. It makes more sense, if theism is true and good and evil are present in the world, that we see exactly what we observe in these forums. If you think hard about it, one view only supports what we observe here. (In regards to human behavior, and in the world and man's history as well.) To look for and hold a view that best explains what we see, is a wise thing to do. You or I need not agree with every aspect of that beings decisions, for them to be actual reality. Life is like that, and I mean that we often don't "agree" with the truths of life around us every day, they are not always ideal or to our preferences, yet we act like that should be true in this case.
How could it be dishonest? Do you mean, not how you would have disclosed yourself to the beings you created? I think how he did it and how things look, look just as they were if there were such a being. Creating the opportunity to see, without forcing, being incredibly patient with them, yet allowing that none would ultimately be without excuse or the knowledge of him,etc. Creating a scenario knowing there would be great fall out, and also being the remedy for that fall out, because the alternative to not allowing it would be actually not good, or pointless at best? Haven't seen a better suggestion yet either, by the naysayers, and a quiet denial that they are indeed suggesting there is a better suggestion without giving one. Its all right there.It is impossible for that to be an honest thing to admit considering there is no evidence whatsoever for a creator. None. It would be very dishonest to admit to such a thing.
All you're doing is looking at our world in it's current form and concluding that's how we were created, yet the evidence does not show that, it shows something completely different, that's why it's dishonest.
Are you serious? There are better explanations, ones that are actually honest because they are based on evidence and facts, not myths and superstitions.Actually, when you look at all of life, it IS very honest to come to a conclusion eventually, that can "get it done", over "not get it done." This is not a "god dun it" response, like so many are quick to jump to. My point is simple, when you have two views (and there are more also), and one is way more reasonable to actually explain and be a sufficient cause for, than the other, that IS being very honest, even if its not your preferred view to hold. THAT, would be true honesty.
To go against what I said, you would be saying that in some cases it does make more sense than not, to hold to a view that isn't sufficient for the topic at hand.
I am not just looking at the world and concluding that is how we were created. How does the evidence NOT show that, like you just said, and how does it show something completely different, like you say? You have to show that, to fairly be calling me dishonest. Your opinions don't count, nor assertions, nor personal beliefs in this case. Actual things count, from the science we all agree one. Cause and effect.
Yes, I am very serious, absolutely. Calling people dishonest over and over isn't an argument for your case, but backing up what yous say MIGHT be, so lets hear it. Remember, you are defending that something non intelligent, of a material nature can get this done, MAKES MORE SENSE, than the opposite being true. To me, that is defending a lesser likely scenario. My personal beliefs are left out of this, I am using reality, logic, reasoning and science for this conclusion. Remember, even Dawkins, couldn't deny this was likely true, though he was VERY uncomfortable doing so, having to admit it.
This idea you are saying some are being dishonest about, actually isn't about myths and superstitions, lets be fair. It is about evidence and facts, and you think no agent causation nor intelligence is necessary, is more capable than the opposite. It seems so obviously a lesser view, and I don't mean it as a put down, it is just a truly inferior view to the opposite is what we actually observe in the world. What I am suggesting, we see supported every single day in life, and this is with all the "stuff" already at our disposal.
What you are suggesting, that nature can do it, a material cause can do it, including at a time before there was anything material, nor any "agency". This is illogical, not rational, not scientific. Consider this too, that your fellow man cares enough about you to point these ideas/facts out to you, that you might not need to insist on missing it. They do so even when you keep calling them dishonest.2Co 4:3 But if our gospel be hid, it is hid to them that are lost:
2Co 4:4 In whom the god of this world hath blinded the minds of them which believe not, lest the light of the glorious gospel of Christ, who is the image of God, should shine unto them.Yes, Sir Dent.
That explains a lot of what we observe, but it also makes me think of all of us. We were all enemies of God. The gospel, to me, is light and life. How the light comes to any of us is a miracle. The things we are speaking of, are light, inherent in the creation/universe, and reality of our maker. The light is available to all in this sense, but how they come to see it sometimes is definitely a God thing too.
Its dark for us, until the light comes in, and the view becomes more clear. I will never say how or when that can happen, but helping to try and shine light, if you have it, seems a good thing to do in such cases as those verses explain. There is often a point of cross over, if God and man allows for it. There isn't a lack of evidence and reasons to think the way we do,and that is what is being countered. Sometimes I pray that God will move in the hearts of people, that might EVER even remotely have an inkling to give him a fair shot, a fair shake. Why he allows us to share and pray for people to seemingly have an effect, is a mystery but its not absent. He does allow for it. Call me strange, but I have my reasons. I hope someone would do that for me too. I also am thinking they may be thinking they are, so take other ideas seriously, but only so far as that they are good ideas. I don't see any better option or idea than what I am holding to currently. Its more than sufficient, a very good explanation and this is even before we get to God's revealed word or Jesus. That is icing on the cake. That he answers my prayers so often, even very big ones, and that I sense him is even more.I bolded the most important part of your post. It is the Gospel that must be taught and preached. Many of these debates are useless IMO.
Ok.
Thanks for your thoughts. Many reject the gospel, as you see. The reasons for rejecting it are many, and those are what is often being answered, and answered well by people that care. Maybe that will help you to see the reason by their doing it then? The claims, and "charges" being brought against things/God, are poor ones, easily negated and shown how.
I hear you too, about possibly useless. I struggle with that, and yet one thing is for sure, not one person will be able to say, there wasn't sufficient evidence, or reasons for taking it seriously. At the very least, giving them every possible chance is a nice thing to do, isn't it? But then, yes even Jesus moved on at some point. He even showed them evidence of power over nature, and they weren't impressed. It so often isn't about the best argument or best evidences, but about something else. More is going on. What explains THAT, the more going on, is also explained by Jesus and the apostles. The other worldviews don't explain the rejecting of good ideas, reasons, and evidences. its observable repeatable behavior, explained again, by ONLY one thing, when nothing else explains it. This is all part of the plan I believe for those wanting or willing to look.
Consider this too, it can be an encouragement to other believers, to see that the constant barage of insults and put downs of both their beliefs and themselves, (?), don't hold water when more closely scrutinized. Many are discouraged, and might think they are maybe believing in something stupid or illogical, not based in truth, fact, science, etc. Its not true. This isn't all just for those it seems directed at. (At least I don't think so.)Yes, we know it what you want to believe, even though it has no evidence and is more myth than anything else. Yes, people have looked and found it to be quite wanting in the face of facts and evidence.
If people want to believe in things that are not based on facts and evidence, especially where the facts and evidence are rejected or denied, they certainly will be viewed as stupid and illogical, as you say. Their rejection and denial of facts and evidence is far more insulting than anything they can be attributed.
It isn't honest if the evidence shows that view to be invalid. It would like saying it is honest to claim you can flap your arms and fly.
The evidence shows evolution, not creation, therefore it is dishonest to claim creation.
That is exactly what the fact support, that the physical laws had everything to do with our universe, and zero evidence for any intelligent beings.
Sorry, but Dawkins is quite certain the evidence shows evolution and not creation. As an evolutionary biologist, that would be his forte.
Yes, it is about evidence and facts, none of which show or suggest any intelligence.
Not according the evidence and facts, no intelligence has ever been shown.
I am not suggesting anything, those are the facts based on the evidence.
And yet, it IS science.
Supporting the myths of creationism in the face of facts is quite dishonest.You twisted around many things, and I didn't say that Dawkins supports creation over evolution, I was speaking of intelligence there and Dawkins. Here is a clip of what I am speaking of there. I did recall seeing him speak on intelligent design, and if you don't want to watch the full video, start it at around 2:50 minutes in.
I have referred to this very thing Dawkins says, several times in these forums, and I think no one believes me! When talking about it fairly, of course its a possibility, nothing else makes sense as much as it does. His version would be more of an extraterrestrial type, but that is something with intellect in this case, and a will and agency. I think that is a VERY fair admission, and his followers might be curious to know he thinks this, or did at one time anyway.
http://youtu.be/Pckg3Kud8_AActually what he said there is a possibility that life started elsewhere and was placed here. He definitely spoke clearly on his non-belief in any God and said that if someone placed that life here that someone would have had to have a beginning as well. The point being that if we find that life couldn't have originated here on earth that doesn't mean it could not have started elsewhere and moved here.
Right. Intelligence. What you say there isn't disagreeing with what I said except for the other being and how it came into being.
He explained how it could come about, including a high level of technology from another part of the universe, and then they might have seeded life onto this planet. He used the words, "and designed a form of life....", etc. An intruiging possibility, a signature of some sort of designer, a higher intelligence from elsewhere in the universe. It also wouldn't have just jumped into existence inexplicably, he said. That is my view also. Very interesting I thought!
From what I hear from many on these forums, I don't think many know about this.
http://youtu.be/Pckg3Kud8_ABut he said that if life came from elsewhere that life must have come from elsewhere. That's where you are getting confused. You can't put words in his mouth like that.
Where am I getting confused? What words did I put in his mouth? I will post the post again that you are referring to where you say I was confused and put words in his mouth, so you can show me. For what its worth, I put what I said there, based directly OFF of what he said in the video I linked to.
"Right. Intelligence. What you say there isn't disagreeing with what I said except for the other being and how it came into being.
He explained how it could come about, including a high level of technology from another part of the universe, and then they might have seeded life onto this planet. He used the words, "and designed a form of life....", etc. An intruiging possibility, a signature of some sort of designer, a higher intelligence from elsewhere in the universe. It also wouldn't have just jumped into existence inexplicably, he said. That is my view also. Very interesting I thought!
From what I hear from many on these forums, I don't think many know about this."You seem to think what he said makes a case for a God? He said no such thing in that clip. He said it's possible life came from elsewhere and it could have come from intelligent beings. That doesn't mean that those being intended for us to evolve.
This shows me you are not really reading my posts carefully, for I said no such thing about Dawkins making a case for God. He wouldn't do that. If you go back to the video, he was answering a question that would explain how the first cell self replicated, and in his answer was that another intelligence somewhere in the universe could be the cause, and he even thinks we can possibly find evidence for it one day.
So not a case for God. A case for Intelligence that started life and got the ball rolling. Does it make sense now what I mean?Sure, thanks. It seemed to me you were jumping to thinking that that intelligence could have been a God.
No, I was agreeing with Dawkins that it could be intelligence that could be cause. I think that makes more sense than simply a materialistic view being the cause. Many naturalists and materialists usually agree with Dawkins, but in this case he said something that really surprised me! I respect that he admitted it, its a huge deal kind of. I think it lines up with the science we observe about our world and its beginnings, its origin.
See, there you go, that's what I was getting at. He didn't say life must have started any other way than naturally. He said life here on earth may have been caused from elsewhere, but that elsewhere would have to have had a beginning as well. In other words, if it is found that earth doesn't or didn't have all the necessary ingredients for life then that live may have started elsewhere where all the necessary ingredients are. He tried to be specific about that.
BTW, I find you refreshing in that you seem to learn and absorb.Since all we know about is this earth and its intelligence, I found it refreshing that Dawkins seemed to think intelligence would explain it, or in that moment he did. He said about the intelligence, that it couldn't have just popped into existence. I agree with that also.
I am glad you think I can learn and absorb, and I hope to always.
Dawkins said that IF Intelligent Design were a possibility, it would be some alien civilization having seeded our planet, but he also goes on to say that alien species would have had to come about as a result of evolution, that they didn't just pop into existence. He said you would need to show evidence this is the case, but there is no evidence for that, either.
He said, "It could come about in the following way....." Then went on to talk about it. (Seen just after the 3 minute mark in the video. http://youtu.be/Pckg3Kud8_A ) He goes on to say it would have been a high level of technology, that maybe could have seeded life on this planet. He said it was an intriguing possibility, and that you might find evidence for that if you look. Look for what? A signature of the details of science, a signature of some sort of designer. (3:50 -ish) "And that designer, could well be a higher intelligence.) I think that is a good idea!
I think what we see, points to it. It has to be a sufficient cause for the effect we see. It has to be able to accomplish what we observe in science, in nature, in humanity. I did notice he held on a little to a materialistic view, but the idea of an intelligence explaining the world we know of is a more fair admission than I have seen in a while from that crowd. That an intelligence could have caused what we see, or the beginning of the first self replicating molecule, is very much NOT a materialistic view in and of itself.
I didn't hear him say "IF", like you did but it would be easy to mistake the "it could have been" for that, perhaps. I went back and listened in case I missed that the other times.
To me its significant, because we ARE dealing with this world, this life and intelligence, and not really speculating (or shouldn't really be) yet on worlds or universes we don't have any evidences of yet. Just interesting....It might be if there were a shred of evidence to support it, but there isn't any.
No, that's not what we see. What we see is that all life originated here on this planet.
This is an example of "Turtles all the way down" You don't seem to understand that if an alien species seeded this planet, they would have had to evolve on their planet and their intelligence would have had to evolve on their planet, so why not this planet?The idea of how an infinite regression of events fails logically, has been spoken about many times on these forums.
The bigger point, was the Dawkins was speaking of the earth we do know of, and when really challenged to try to explain how that first self replicating molecule he gave this answer. He gave an answer that was one of a being with intelligence and agency. Do you know why? Because a materialist view can't account for what we know of our own planet.
I am going with the evidence. Intelligence with agency, a "mover", could account for it. I truly think that if he could have answered ANY other way than saying it could have been intelligence, he would have.
That the idea of multiple E.T.'s going back forever would fail in the logic dept., doesn't negate the intelligence explanation for this earth we know it now would make more sense to him to have an intelligent being, being the cause, over a materialistic process. Or natural process. He was being very honest, and I really respect that kind of honesty.
I wasn't going to respond to this because I found it hard to follow. But I'll give it a shot.
Science logic and reason tells me that if we held on the stories of the bible we all believe in a young universe and earth. Some of you have reinterpreted the text so as to include evolution and an old universe, but the order of creation is still way out of order no what you say. Now you assume a creator created all this just for us simple because he wants us to choose him and his way, but doesn't want to reveal himself as not to take away our free will. I suggest that would be dishonest much like a father telling his son in a letter that the reason why he is absent is because he wants him to be a good person without his support. Some fill the gap in with their imagination and say that God gives them things they need because he loves them like lost keys and such and completely ignoring the prayers of others to save a dying child. You claim it's logical that something created the earth, but I say you say that because you don't understand it so you claim God done it. It's not logical to use your imagination to explain the universe rather than studying and looking for the answers. A universe of billions of galaxies each with billions of stars and planets doesn't sound like logic if one is saying it's all for us. That sounds arrogant with perhaps an ego that isn't in complete control over thought.Well, I appreciate you sharing that, and it does help me to know what you think and believe and at least partly why. I don't believe he left us without revelation and information about him, and I think you and I just disagree on what counts as proof. Not being a materialist, I am not limited to only having a materialistic evidence count for evidence of things. I think that is very limiting to individuals, personally. Also, what you say is often a person's imagination, may not be just their imagination at all. This is an opinion or assertion of yours.
When God answers prayers, he isn't then obligated to answer all the prayers prayed to him in order for him to exist.
I don't ever say "god done it", by the way, but if I did, it wouldn't be because I don't understand it. That is another assertion. I don't see why the galaxies and stars have to be for all of us, and not sure who would ever say that. Maybe that is why it doesn't sound like logic to you? I am sorry if you think I am arrogant, and if my post was hard to follow. But again, while I jumped around here in response, I do appreciate you taking the time to share what you did there.
I think you mean omniscient. But, your saying He destroys all the people who end up being how they are aside from His will because...? If He knew it would happen, why would he destroy them for it? What was the point of the flood? It didn't change anything. Did He make a mistake? Clearly the flood didn't work... But more importantly, why would He need to send a flood if He wanted people to have free will in the first place and He knew and understood the cost of it?
We still don't see a basis for that statement.Yes, you're right, I did mean omniscient, thank you.
What I'm trying to say is that He did not know. I think it's clear He knew He was introducing a volatile element into the world, because of the way in which He did it. But in the explanation for the flood at the beginning of Genesis 6 it says that God "regretted" putting humans on the earth. I don't think He knew until it was done that this would happen.
Gen6:5-8 - The Lord saw how great the wickedness of the human race had become on the earth, and that every inclination of the thoughts of the human heart was only evil all the time. 6 The Lord regretted that he had made human beings on the earth, and his heart was deeply troubled. 7 So the Lord said, “I will wipe from the face of the earth the human race I have created—and with them the animals, the birds and the creatures that move along the ground—for I regret that I have made them.” 8 But Noah found favor in the eyes of the Lord.
He had made a species on the earth in the same image/likeness as Adam and Eve and their off-spring, and at some point along the way the descendants of Adam and Eve "saw that the daughters of humans were beautiful, and they married any of them they chose(v2)". I think the regret He felt was because this was an unintended outcome that had an undesired result. This intermingling introduced this volatile element into humanity, and it made them wicked.
I think the flood did work. Initially, when this intermingling happened, it says that wickedness was prevalent and that "every inclination of the thoughts of the human heart was only evil all the time". So He started again through Noah, a specimen who showed favorable traits. After the flood, once they began to breed again, they weren't all wicked all the time. In fact they were working together and building a city and a tower. So He then scattered them throughout an already populated world, like planting seeds in fertile soil. In the context of history as I read this, if I'm right about where in history this happened, this is the event that set the modern human world in motion. It was this scattering, caused by the Sahara transforming back into desert around 3900BC, that spawned multiple human civilizations and birthed the ancient world as we know it.
"We still don't see a basis for that statement."
I mean it is free will that gives us the capability to criticize. Only the arrogance of a free willed ego could look at this elaborate natural world around us and say, "Is this really the best you could do?""Methuselah is a 4845-year-old[1] Great Basin bristlecone pine (Pinus longaeva) tree growing high in the White Mountains of Inyo County in eastern California.[2][3] For many years it was the world's oldest known living non-clonal organism, until superseded by the discovery in 2013 of another bristlecone pine in the same area with an age of 5064 years (germination in 3051 BC)."
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Methuselah_%28tree%29I'm not sure what your point is. California is nowhere near southern Mesopotamia, so a regional flood would have no impact. If you think I'm talking about a global flood, then even that wouldn't be far enough back as that tree germinated nearly 1000 years after the flood (4000BC).
So you are one of those who think that a boat that size could float around for a year within a local flood without anyone seeing any land? Or do you acknowledge that there may have been a rather large exaggeration?
I think it's entirely possible considering how close to the Persian gulf they were. For all we know they could have washed out to see and back. But really, in that region as its laid out, a flood wouldn't actually have to be that large and still appear to engulf everything.
"Because of the curvature of the earth, the horizon drops from where the viewer is standing. However, the drop is proportional to the square of the distance between the viewer and an object on the horizon (Young nd). From these relationships, it can be seen that a tribal chief (or Noah) standing on the deck of a large boat (Ark), perhaps 7.8 meters above the water,would not be able to see the tops of any hills as high as 15 m from as little as 24 km away across flood plains covered with water because the curvature of the earth prevents it (See the Appendix for examples of calculations). Most hills in this region that are as much as 15 m high are more than 95 km away from the river levees. Therefore, the survivors of the Flood could see only water in all directions while they were floating down the Tigris River and over the flood plains. Many of these hills would also be partly covered with water which would make their tops project less above the water level, and therefore, the curvature of the earth would make them disappear from the line of sight in even a shorter distance than 24 km.
Northeast and southwest of the nearly flat surface that contains the two rivers, the topography rises to more than 455 m in Saudi Arabia and in Iran. Calculations show that elevations of 455 m high cannot be seen beyond 86 km away, and these places are more than 160 km from the Euphrates or Tigris Rivers. Therefore, none of the high country in Saudi Arabia or Iran would be visible to a tribal chief (or Noah). On that basis, the "whole world" would definitely appear to be covered with water during the Flood, and that was the "whole world" for the people in this part of southeastern Mesopotamia at that time." - ncse.com/rncse/29/5/yes-noahs-flood-may-have-happened-not-over-whole-earthHa, to make this work you think they could had gotten washed out to sea and washed right back into the very same spot and the translators of the bible all got it wrong after the fact.
Floating out into the Persian gulf is a distinct possibility, but not required. And yes, it's entirely possible translators got it wrong. When you're attempting to read any story without understanding the proper context of the story, which no biblical translator before this modern age would have had, then it's entirely possible. Even likely. Especially when you consider just how different ancient Hebrew is from our more modern languages. There's a lot of assumptions that have to be made to translate an ancient text like that.
Uh, if the Earth is estimated by young earth creationists to be 6000 years old and the flood was estimated at about 1400 years after the Earth was created, these trees would have to have been living underwater for about a year.
Well then that's good information to give a young earth creationist. But according to my viewpoint it's totally irrelevant.
Of course, it is. Facts are totally irrelevant to you.
Clearly facts are not irrelevant to me. Only facts irrelevant to what I'm talking about. Trees on the other side of the world from where this regional flood happened are irrelevant.
No one here was making that case.
I only mention this now, because I think a lot of the "conflict" on these forums are sometimes due to things like this, leveling an argument against another who wasn't ever in disagreement or making the opposite argument. Maybe if we slow down, and really read and respond to what IS being written, and try and make arguments against THOSE things, we will save a lot of our time and pointless going back and forth. We could then discuss the points actually being made. It is a recurring event that I observe, so thought it worth pointing out here.
Sounds like a cool tree, by the way, lol.
Sorry, but even other animals without self awareness criticize each other.
What animals without self awareness criticize each other? If this has been asked already, I just haven't seen it yet. Trying to catch up.
You've never seen a dog correct another dog? Wolves have leaders and he correct behavior he doesn't like. All pack animals correct/criticize each other. When chimps dislike the behavior of one of their own they will attack and sometime kill.
Oh, I was thinking in the context of the conversation that had been happening, where it was pointed out that our ability to criticize comes from free will. What you said about animals criticizing each other was in response to this quote from HVN,
" I mean it is free will that gives us the capability to criticize. Only the arrogance of a free willed ego could look at this elaborate natural world around us and say, "Is this really the best you could do?"'
To which you said,
"Sorry, but even other animals without self awareness criticize each other."
Which was an interesting response, I thought. You meant by criticize there, the animal behaviors you mentioned, based on your post above. I am not sure this is an example that negates the idea of a free will of the human to criticize a possible creator. Very clearly, the human criticizing how this universe appears, seems to come out of free will. That animals get upset with each other or even correct their young, etc, doesn't negate that we have the free will to criticize. Or does it, to you?You don't think a dog has ever tried to correct his owner? Criticism is criticism. Dogs don't understand the concept of God, but they know right from wrong and will let you know they are not pleased.
You are correct in pointing out that dogs do correct their owners, and I have seen them correct their young, as cats do, etc. I am simply pointing out that the observance of animals "criticizing" each other in this way doesn't make the case, that people AREN'T using their free will when they criticize the design or order in our universe. I think someone operating with a free will could do that.
Your answer or rebuttal seemed to be that animals that are not self aware, criticize each other. If you think this shows that humans aren't using their free will to criticize, then what ARE they using to criticize what we observe? What IS making you and others here criticize the way you do, if you are not choosing to do so when you do? If something other than your free will is making you do that, what is it, and then your case would be made. Showing that animals correct their owners doesn't achieve that, but I could be wrong, and you or others could help me out there. I could be misunderstanding something key there, but if I am would appreciate the correction.Okay, so I've demonstrated that humans are not unique in our criticism. Humans are not even the only animals what are self aware. What is free will? Are we free to decide and criticize? If other animals without self awareness criticize, what does that mean? We criticize when we know or feel we or others are being mistreated or not treated fairly. Now if one feels that free will is unique to humans, one must see that criticizing is not unique to humans and there for either most mammals at least have free will or free will has nothing to do with criticizing.
What do you mean by free will?I think the two different kinds of criticism being talked about shed light on this.
As for free will, having a will inside of us to choose whatever we want to do. I could be wrong on this. I don't know why there would be such an elaborate "trick" of sorts being played to let us all think we are really choosing all the things we do everyday.
To me, the opposite of free will is to not have free will. Nothing in the world looks to me like we don't have that. It looks like we do have it. Our choices. We can choose to rebel, and like HVN said and Slarty, to choose a will against Gods, or something like that, could be a good definition. We do that too, if that is the definition.
A lot of what i will ever talk about is our observations in life. We all claim to want truth, and truth is in part, reality. What we observe, is usually "true." I observe people making all kinds of good and bad choices every day, and they are allowed to even when it hurts them. Free will.
So one, you said He did not know so He's not omniscient, then? You kind of contradicted yourself. Not long ago you said "Of course, being omnipotent (of course you meant omniscient), He'd immediately know as soon as free will was introduced. It's not like He had to wait and see what would happen." But just now you said "What I'm trying to say is that He did not know... I don't think He knew until it was done that this would happen." Which is it? Is He omniscient or isn't He?
And secondly, if He has regrets, does that mean He makes mistakes?
Again, so did He make a mistake, or was this done purposefully and He knew full well what the outcome would be? Just because He "regretted" it doesn't mean He didn't know what would or could happen. A man that let's his child play with a gun knows what could happen. Something goes wrong, he may later regret it, but he knew it was a possible outcome. Unless he was ignorant/naive.
A specimen? Good grief. You already know where I stand with this God-is-a-scientist view of yours. We're all basically at the mercy of His whim, then, like the poor rats in their cages? If He is not omniscient, what right did He have to put all of this in motion? Actually, what right did He have to do it even if He is omniscient? If He really didn't take our well being into consideration before conducting the experiment he is less ethically inclined than us even. The IRB exists so that human researchers can't act like this God does. We thought to say "hey, we should develop a system of guidelines to make sure we harm people a little as possible on the quest for knowledge and to understand ourselves better." What possible reason, by the way, could someone omniscient have to conduct an experiment in the first place? Just curious.
The Tower of Babel
11 Now the whole world had one language and a common speech. 2 As people moved eastward,[a] they found a plain in Shinar[b] and settled there.
3 They said to each other, “Come, let’s make bricks and bake them thoroughly.” They used brick instead of stone, and tar for mortar. 4 Then they said, “Come, let us build ourselves a city, with a tower that reaches to the heavens, so that we may make a name for ourselves; otherwise we will be scattered over the face of the whole earth.”
5 But the Lord came down to see the city and the tower the people were building. 6 The Lord said, “If as one people speaking the same language they have begun to do this, then nothing they plan to do will be impossible for them. 7 Come, let us go down and confuse their language so they will not understand each other.”
8 So the Lord scattered them from there over all the earth, and they stopped building the city. 9 That is why it was called Babel[c]—because there the Lord confused the language of the whole world. From there the Lord scattered them over the face of the whole earth. Gen. 11:1-9
You make the scatter sound positive, and yet from this text, it sounds a lot more like He wasn't happy that they were building this tower, at all... And that He also did not want them to be able to understand each other. Otherwise, what was the harm in letting them stay together in one place? i mean this stuff is really eating away at your whole free will thing, honestly. It must've have been all a part of His pointless "plan," anyway, like everything else that happened. (You're gently skirting along the ideology of Calvinists because if you believe He's omniscient, omnipresent, and omnipotent, then that's eventually where it will lead.)
That's unlikely, especially the date since we found a 9,000 year old man here in the states (research Kennewick Man).
LoL, is that arrogance? No wonder people perpetuate the slave mindset. Isn't it more arrogant for the one that created it to say that he couldn't have done it better? When a scientist/researcher writes a paper, they are forced to acknowledge what could have been done better. Only the arrogant ones say "nothing."
(I'm also curious of your response to my other post. I'm going to re-post it, it's kind of far back there. )When did this happen? 4-6 thousand years ago? I guess we can ignore all the evidence of other civilizations from before that time.
Sounds reasonable, except if they were the only people why the need to make a name for themselves?
So he doesn't want us to build cities and towers, what was he afraid of, towers can't reach heaven, we know that now.
Divide and concur.Hey ATW, I'm working on catching up with posts I've been meaning to reply to. I think there's at least one other of yours I hope to get to today. But I also want to go through the links and such you referred to before I do. But, to start, here's my reply to this post ... http://hubpages.com/forum/post/2545610
Regarding an omniscient God who could not know, I know that sounds like a contradiction, but really it isn't. God can know all things that happen or will happen because He does not experience time and space as we do. Considering how He's described in light of how we now understand time and space, this would mean that He, existing apart from the universe and therefore apart from time-space as we perceive it, would be able to observer every moment everywhere all at once. There's no span of time between now and then and no span of space between here and there. So there's nothing within this universe and timeline that He cannot know.
However, in the case of introducing free will, it's not someone within the world and timeline making this change. It's God, who exists apart from it. So He is, in affect, altering the way the universe/time/space would have played out otherwise by introducing an element that, by design, does not behave exactly according to His will, but of their own. This is why I said it's not like He would have to wait and see what would happen. As soon as He makes this change, He would know the entirety of how it plays out immediately. But because it's a free will doing things that are not of His will, He actually wouldn't know until He created it. Until it existed. Much like when He tested Abraham. This is why an omniscient God would still have to test him. Because God created the situation that then caused Abraham to have to make that decision. If God had never created the situation, Abraham never would have made that decision, therefore that decision would not have existed anywhere in the timeline for God to be able to see it. I know this can be tricky, but it is not a contradiction.
Regarding God's regret creating humans on the Earth, no I don't think He made a mistake and I do think He knew it could go wrong. This is why I think He chose the location He did. Because if something did go wrong, He could flood it, just as He did. This is why I find what He did so significant. He created this highly volatile and unpredictable capability to give us our own minds and wills. He purposefully made something outside of His control. A truly free will that is independent of His.
I know you take issue with the God as a scientist analogy, but that analogy was more to convey an alternate way of reading the story and seeing His actions in a different light. Because it's always read as if God was in total control, things like the flood and His regret and Babel and testing Abraham and all of that makes it seem as if He's cruel or unethical. I think it's the other way around. Giving us free will, creating us with our own minds and wills, is an incredible gift. And to do so meant introducing something into the world that doesn't behave like a cohesive part of the system, but more like a cancer or virus. Because it's an element with its own mind and motivations. So, the only way to create this capability in this environment is to just do it and then make adjustments to account for the impact it would have.
The Babel story is a tricky one, but I don't think it was a bad thing or a punishment. It more has to do with God's ultimate purpose. Rather than it "eating away at [my] whole free will thing", on the contrary I think it had everything to do with free will. I think the entirety of the planet has to do with it. That dispersing, assuming it happened as it did, is what created one of the primary dynamics that shape our modern world. It's the separation of language and culture. That component alone really stirs things up. Makes dealing with one another a challenge. I don't think the point of creating this environment and creating free will was just so we could live easily and care free. Free will is about the choices we make, why we make them, and the impact of those choices. That's what we learn from and what shapes us. To put it simply, wielding a free will of our own takes wisdom. It takes knowing and understanding the impact of your decisions. And wisdom is not something that can simply be given. It must be learned.
The Kennewick Man is a fascinating find, but it doesn't contradict what I'm saying. The crux of this hypothesis is that the planet was already populated by humans when Adam was created. That's the one flaw in how these stories are traditionally interpreted that makes it so seemingly disconnected from history. I think the world was populated just as the standard scientific model shows. I think these were the humans created in Genesis 6. I think Adam was created apart from this, around 5500BC. These are the humans that I think Adam's descendants found beautiful and began to breed with, introducing free will into humanity. This is the action I think God 'regretted'. Those of us born of 'civilized cultures' are those who are of both bloodlines, naturally evolved humans, and Adam/Eve. The introduction of free will through Adam and Eve, then the scattering of their descendants at Babel into an already populated world, is what I think resulted in the dawning of multiple civilizations, all in the same relative region, all roughly around the same time, each with their own unique language.
As or arrogance, yeah I think it's fair to call it that. Think about it this way. Here we are, slowing piecing together how everything came together. Slowing figuring out how everything works. We barely understand what we do know and have a pretty good idea there's still a whole lot we don't know. So for us humans to look at the world around us, the natural world that shaped us and made it possible for us to be here and observe and think for ourselves, and come to the conclusion that it could have been done better, or different, I think is pretty arrogant. Whether you think a conscious/intelligent God was involved or not.
It is still always a little shocking to read how bad people think God is for allowing them to choose what they choose, as if the very thing being suggested otherwise, is NOT being suggested. Its not a cliche to say this either, its the truth. Idea - wise, its the alternative, to not have free will. On any other normal day, the people seeming the most upset by this idea, would see this for the plain fact it is. It shows me we aren't really dealing with what are good vs. bad ideas. It looks a lot more like people shaking their fist at God, blaming him for everything. The tone suggests even more.
In this context/idea, he didn't fail at giving you life, and the very air you breathe many times over every minute, yet he's a colossal screw up... uh, ok. Strange how two different people can look at the very same thing with such a 180 degree view. This is what we are dealing with.
If you were God, and made everything or set it into motion, the creator, then I suppose in keeping with your thinking, you would not have allowed anything but your own free will to play out? Like a show, or a play? That would be evil to many, I dare say, to your own self. That is the flip side of what you are going after. So to suggest what you have, is to suggest that, which I REALLY doubt is your view. So what more is going on here? A great question.That could be in response to those who worship and praise God for good things happening. It's called being honest.
What is called being honest? What do you mean exactly, because I read my post and your again, and its not clear. Thanks.
It's honest to rail at God when bad things happen if it is honest to praise God when good things happen.
Oh, ok, well God can take a good "railing at", and Christians do that too on occasion, or even often when they are hurting, etc. He can take it, and knows when we are thinking it anyway. But what comes with God getting blame, are HIS explanations for why things are the way they are. You can't honestly and fairly rail against him, AND ignore the reasons for the way reality is. It wouldn't be responsible, though it is allowed.
Speaking of what you just mentioned, I see people not being thankful for the good things, and railing against him for almost everything else.
"Idea - wise" - you can't get mad at your government for having rules (many unpleasant), and having enforcement of them at some point. You can't get mad at your local judge, not even one that would/could convict you of something you did, You can be thankful for your having a go at life in your free society, and be thankful for the entities that make it happen, but you can't fairly balk at them when your reality/life changes. You can't logically, reasonably, "want it all", break the rules and not get what comes with it, to not get the reality that comes with it.
Yet this is the same idea, or very similar, being balked at. I say its not logical, and the other idea, what we observe in our lives, makes more sense. We can't keep (not honestly), switching up things to suit us personally. To the law breaker in the above case, what do you want to bet he isn't thanking the authorities for cuffing him and sentencing him and having him pay the fine or do the time? From his point of view, very evil even! How dare they! Why don't they make it so he can do what he wants AND have no consequences?! Well, that isn't how life works. Even nature has its own laws, and we CAN violate them, but not without consequence. Yet we expect the possible creator of a universe to act so differently, and when we KNOW better. I am just trying to point it out, as others seem to be also. (Sometimes.)
If a god exists you have “free” will only so you can choose him freely, or not. What a waste of will, and what an egotistical god that would be were it true. And nowhere in your bible does it say god gave you free will yet you act like it was the first thing he did.
You would have separate will anyway, a unique will which is the manifestation of your conditioning. Not free in any real sense but separate from everyone else’s.
Were a god to have created all this he would be responsible for everything that has happened and does happen. Why? Because he knows all in advance so to allow those to be born who he knows are going to hell to suffer for eternity would be the cruellest thing imaginable.
You have to kill if you want to eat and live and those things you kill suffer. They and we suffer disease and poverty and all kinds of tragedy.
For a conscious god to have done this, any god, it could not be forgiven if it could have done it any other way.
I’m not raising my fist at god because I don’t believe a god like yours exists. This is just the way it is and has to be, so no malice exists in a process, even if it feels like it sometimes.
I’m just working within your myth and telling you what it looks like from the outside. I’m being realistic where as you can’t be because of your beliefs.
What would I do? Probably create humans that do not have to eat or drink or breath air, do not suffer and do not get disease, and know a hell of a lot more than we do right off the hop,
And I wouldn't expect to be worshiped or even be thanked. And yes, they could make their own choices as to how to live.
But that’s for starters.
I guess it would be like heaven without the death to get there.First off, it's not a free will just to choose Him freely. It's kind of the other way around. Because the will is free, you have to choose Him freely, rather than being predisposed to work according to His will/natural law. The bible doesn't call it "free will", but what it describes is God, the creator of the universe, that all the natural world bends to the will of, humans from Adam forward were able to behave contrary to that. It's a central theme throughout the entirety of the story.
Though I think eternal damnation is a kind of boogy-man invention of organized religion, as the traditional Christian concept of Satan and hell are nothing like the Jewish understanding, if there is to be free will then there will inevitably be those who do not choose to choose Him. It's either a free will with some who will not choose, or no free will.
Living in a world with sharp edges and teeth, where there's danger and the potential for suffering and death, is just the kind of place to bring about something like free will. This means there are real dangers and repercussions for our actions. Harm can be done. Death could come tomorrow. It's the suffering and the pain that gives us the appreciation when we are not in pain and suffering. Take a tooth ache, for example. Before ever having one you can't hardly imagine what it must be like. But once you've had one all you want is relief. Once that relief comes you appreciate your tooth not hurting way more than you ever could have before.
If you were a God capable of creation you'd basically have three choices; no existence, existence where everyone and everything behaves exactly according to your will, or an existence with beings with their own minds and own wills. Having that choice makes love what it is, because if you were 'naturally predisposed' to love, it would not be a choice but would rather just be natural behavior. The choices and the sacrifices we make matter because of free will. And it's not that God demands that you worship Him. If that's all He wanted He didn't have to give us free will and all the earth could just exist in perfect peace. But with free will, you have to choose willfully. Much in the same way cells in a body adhere to the DNA code of the body so that trillions of cells can work together as a collective and form one being. If each of those cells were capable of choosing whether or not to adhere to the DNA code, you can imagine the impact this would have. For us to live in eternity, and have our own minds and wills, it's a requirement that we acknowledge the creator as the authority and adhere to the laws He sets.
Much like traffic laws. We each have the freedom to use the roads and go where ever we like whenever we like. But because there are others using the roads as well, there must be rules. Even though there are rules in place against it, you can still choose to drive the wrong way on a freeway. But if you do, if you continue to break the rules and refuse to acknowledge the authority of those who set and enforce those rules, you can and will be removed from the roads for the benefit of everyone else.
If there's just one will for all of eternity then there's no issue. But when there are many, each with a will of their own, then there will inevitably be conflict and therefore rules are necessary, as is a respect for the one who sets and enforces those rules.Your first sentence is false, which is the basis for your next put down and complaints about God.
Perhaps before we move forward, we need to understand what your definition IS of free will?
I thought we had been over people's responsibility for their actions, and a being able to view those actions?
For you to share some of the views you do, do you see that you are in essence judging god for not doing things like you would? You would have done this, but not that, etc. For the God of the universe, you deem what he has done as unforgivable. He may deem something else as unforgivable, and be God.... then what?
Each of us has to decide what constitutes malice or not. Being malicious means something in particular.
The comment about me not being able to be realistic at all about my beliefs, and you can, is not a true statement. What I see almost non stop in these forums, are people not even being honest ABOUT what the other person's views even are, which would immediately negate their ability to be realistic with the first and glaring error present. This is why its good for us to talk in particulars.
So you did answer toward the end, and I appreciate that. You also would allow people to have free will. So you and the god in question, disagree on some of the biggies, yes, but not this biggie, of free will. So even for those that seem to rail against him, they got to experience their life, in an incredible body that seems miraculous in itself it is such a wonderful thing. They got to have free will, make decisions on the biggest issues of the heart and mind, and I think that isn't anything to "shake a stick at." We do know for sure that we had absolutely nothing to do with our being here, and yet we are. Our bodies heal themselves, and get to love and choose what to do in free time, etc. Its a gift, that we didn't earn, is one way to look at it. IF there is an intelligent being out there, I want to know more about him/her/it, and at least say thank you. To find out their thoughts about me and my life and all of humanity, might be a next step. To assume we would agree on everything, well I wouldn't assume that at all. We don't really do that with humans we experience life with, much less a being that we probably can't begin to fathom."our first sentence is false, which is the basis for your next put down and complaints about God.
Perhaps before we move forward, we need to understand what your definition IS of free will?
Well you and Headly are in the minority. most christians tell me that. I'm not making it up.
I think Headly is the only one who has ever given me a good description of "free" will. A will separate from gods.
But I know what will is and it may be separate and individual but it is not free. it is a manifestation of your personal conditioning.
Again, if I make up a game and make up the rules and know what you will do then the game is my fault. Your god sets us up to fail and then punishes with hell. He wants you to follow his rules but you have to want to. If you don’t want to he makes you suffer.
If you were told in pregnancy that your child might live for a while but it be very mentally challenged and it would suffer pain every day of its short life, would you have it knowing you are bringing it in to hell? Or would you choose not to have it? What would be the most humane thing to do?
But your god knows in advance that we will go to hell and suffer eternity but he chooses to allow us to be born anyway? How cruel is that?
But again as always you will defend your mythical god as being all good and righteous when it must be clear to even you that it isn’t.
No you cannot be rational about this because this is god we are talking about. Perhaps you fear it too much to see the truth? Can’t allow those ideas in your head?
I know. Not your fault I suppose.Slarty, I don't know of a single person that thinks that free will is just the free will to choose God, Christian or otherwise. My sentence there that I just typed, proves I am not just choosing God with my free will which would be a contradiction in the truth I observe about humanity. Still, if this made me in the minority some how, I would gladly stay in the minority. I would rather side with a good argument or truth over being part of a majority that doesn't have a good argument.
I find it curious that if there is indeed a "higher court", where justice rules and injustice is answered, that we would expect it to be free of consequences. We already live and know that it makes sense in our world now, and don't give up on our own system even when we have to suffer because we MIGHT insist on breaking our own rules. To follow your idea through, you are in essence suggesting God have made us unable to break the rules, which makes no sense. (And again is against the free will you even agreed you would do.) Its being way too ungrateful to really contemplate, for one. People that break the law often are not fond of the "law" and how the breaking of it steals their own freedom away. We are truly blaming the wrong thing. To test this, imagine a world where good guys get to have their freedom but also the bad guys get to break the laws the other ones keep, and they ALSO get to have their freedom to keep on carrying on with their law breaking. A simple pause for less than 10 seconds can let any of us imagine what a horrifying world that would be, basically run by those that would exact the most terror onto others to get what they want. I sincerely believe you don't want the world you keep suggesting, even if you are not coming right out and saying it.
The thing this often reverts back to, that I see, is that we want what God has already given us, but we want it with no rules, OR if there are rules, then we don't want the consequences. OR, at the very least, we just think God should really do it exactly as we would. That might be ok, but as it stands, he is nuts?
Also, I might have missed it, but you didn't address the fact you would have done the very same thing, to give free will. The next question to answer would be, what happens to those that defy your rules or laws? Do they get to live forever for going against you, after you gave them life and asked they just obey? Knowing they all won't if you did give them the free will, how is that creating a "just and free" kind of life for all the others that did obey the laws? What if you even forgave and were patient beyond imagination, and set some terms that they could do to get back into your good graces? Crazy things like acknowledge you, and trust you? I think we have things quite a bit backwards.
I think you maybe don't realize you are still kind of arguing for a world you yourself have basically admitted you would never create, one without free will. I think you think it might truly be so much more simple than it is, if you gave it some sincere and the most basic thought. Not allowing humans to ever "be", because they with their own volition chose to go against you, is still creating a world WITHOUT free will then. Do you see this dilemma?
So that means that only Jews or descendants from Adam have original sin?
In short, it seems some are saying that there is no evidence for God, and when asked what evidence would look like we see answers like "God, equivalents of squirrel poop, and (that was about it)" So we can't have a clear answer what would constitute as evidence, an that there is definitely no such evidence.
This is the base, after repeated questioning. If this isn't a red flag that something is askew at best, then what could be? I say this out of care and concern, though it might seem out of frustration and it is a little bit of that too, possibly.I did not say there definitely isn't any. You and yours have just not come up with any yet, and if it is not real you never will. So keep looking and let us know when you have some.
I could take it all more seriously if you were to add in, "according to me...." No such evidence exists, according to me. Simple enough. That is what it is after all. None exists to you, because of your parameters, and what is even allowed to count as existence. If one didn't want to admit this, I can understand that because it would be looking like I was rigging the game possibly to ensure favorable results, though I am not saying I could possibly know your reasoning.
We can be rational, or irrational, and rationalize quite a bit. We all can. We do it when we do it, regardless of acknowledgement. These are harder things, and people in America at least are liking less and less to deal with the harder things, or critical thinking. I think it hurts us, even if it feels less painful along the way.
To A Thousand Words, (or anyone else....) regarding things that are and are not, and material vs. immaterial, what about the laws of logic? The laws of logic are an example of something that does not exist in space, has no weight or respond to the laws of physics, and that we employ and use all the time. The laws of logic are a reality we can know directly that is not physical/material. Some have said it is supra-natural, or beyond what is natural or material. This process takes place in our mind, yet you can't open it up and say with your five senses, "found her logic, its right there, see?" Yet it is there and even helps people survive situations sometimes.
Armageddon is two Hebrew words Arma Geddon which means a gathering of nations.
or a league of nations or united nations. Sound familiar? When the world forms a united nation then Christ return is close at had.
The united nations hates God and Christians
This corresponds with thethree frogs that come out of the mouth of the beast to take peace from the earth. The three frogs are Harm, Lies of hope and change and deception . This form of government is socialism.With people going back to the ways of life that passed centuries ago and doing things not pleasing God then certainly that will happen.
Well, "brief" is my middle name, so ....
So is that HeadlyBriefvonnoggin or HeadlyvonBriefnoggin?
We know that throughout life experience, especially when we're young, our minds absorb information. Our conscious mind makes it seem as if the outside world is something separate from us, and that even our own bodies are some foreign thing we have to learn along the way. Our whole concept of reality is created by the mind using the information we collect through our senses. Physical information, physical light and sound waves, smells from sampled particles, etc, that's then stored in the brain as memories. It's through this concept built by the mind that we associate with the outside world around us. We develop our personality through interacting with reality, through learning how to appease the wants of our Id in the face of reality. So yes, damage to the brain can alter your whole concept of reality, right and wrong, memories, personality, everything.
Yes, we can map out the brain by associating specific regions with specific actions. To quite an extent. The most fascinating of findings in my mind is when the tie between the two halves of the brain is severed. Without that tie the two sides of the brain seem to work independently of one another, and can even contradict one another.
So I'm not suggesting everyone just stop studying the brain or anything of the sort. I'm not saying anyone should adopt what I think. The statements I'm addressing are very specific. They're statements that make claims that say we can observe the mind. Because we can put someone in an MRI or CT machine and see activity, they're saying we can 'see' the mind. And that eventually we'll be able to read/predict the mind once all the information is in because we already understand it in nature, we're now just waiting for the details to be filled in. I'm not saying so and so's mind is closed because they won't accept what I'm saying. I'm refuting what others are saying who are making direct statements that are not factually accurate. Like when someone says there is no soul. So, when I try to argue against that statement, or correct the factual inaccuracies, I'm then accused to trying to push my baseless speculation onto others. That is not the case. I'm trying to show that what the other person is saying IS baseless speculation.
Personally, it seems a bit beyond the pale to be so willing to assign consciousness, reason, self-awareness, intelligence, love, passion, pride, and everything else that we experience to being products of matter. We have no reason to think matter is capable of these things in all we've studied. There's nothing our brains are made of that isn't on the periodic table, no configuration or mixing of elements we're aware of, that would make matter capable of these kinds of things, yet we have no problem reducing it all down to being products of the brain because if the brain is broken it seems to break that stuff too. We don't even really get what 'life' and 'death' is, other than activity or a lack of. Damage to the brain would certainly hinder one's capability to fully emote their wants and needs, or even their ability to interact with reality, but that doesn't necessarily mean the activity we see in the brain is the whole story. We just know it's heavily involved. If there's no soul then it appears it's a mechanism that runs itself deterministically, and if there is a soul then it's a mechanism that is operated by an unseen 'driver'.
These are some of the reasons I think as I do, but I recognize there's nothing here to convince others to drop what they think and pick this up. My statements are almost always to refute a statement someone else made, or to at least show where what I believe would fit in the equation in the context of what we know.You keep using the word "mind" as if it's a separate entity from the brain. I need to understand your basis for this distinction. I know that you are convinced that the mind is not simply a function of the brain, but why is that? From a naturalistic perspective, there is no reason for us to think that the mind is any more than a function of the brain. What is your basis for claiming that it is separate and higher than the brain?
Animals also use their senses to perceive the world, some of them have memories similar to us, many don't, but they still interact with the world that way, they still have to make neural connections/learn, they have to be able to tell the difference between themselves, their kin, and an enemy, they have to process light, sound waves, etc... They have to see the world a certain way to live in it. And these functions are also affected by physical attributes as well as their brain makeup and if they have brain damage. But animals must have a "mind" according to your perception of it then, as well? What does it matter if you communicate if the individual on the receiving end doesn't understand it's meaning? Sure animals have less complicated language systems (as far as we know, though we're learning that whales may use syntax), but even understanding what a certain call means is the difference between life and death and would be impossible if the brain wasn't processing the meaning of it.
I'm recommending a TED talk to you. A woman named Jill Bolte Taylor spoke about her experience with a stroke and it's called "A Stroke of Insight." She talks about all the illusions you speak of. It's not really new information, but it's wonderful how her experience made her such a positive and inspiring speaker. If anything her experience adds to what we already know and to some Eastern spiritual/philosophical ideas.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UyyjU8fzEYU
Why?
Yeah, the information is fascinating about what happens.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lfGwsAdS9Dc
To me, a really fascinating part is that he's unaware of how his mind is effected, and yet you should notice the scene where they ask him why he said music after he had pointed to the bell. His nonspeaking right brain saw bell, so he was able to point out the picture. His speaking left brain saw music, but he wasn't actually aware of this. They asked him why he said music, and his left brain came up with the reason that it was because he heard bells ringing earlier outside.
Here's a video of reconstructed output from a cat's brain. We think we have good reason to hypothesize that we'll be able to see more than output at some point. The only basis that you can say this won't happen is that you think that the mind isn't solely a function of the brain. If we continue with the naturalistic view that it is, I don't see why we won't be able to.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FLb9EIiSyG8
There's also a video of people whose brain activity was reconstructed showing images of a video that had been shown and them attempting to remember it, I think. I have to find that video.
How is it factual that we have a "soul?" Belief in a soul causes duality in thinking (sin nature/natural nature vs. spiritual nature) that doesn't exist if one doesn't believe in a soul. But do you know that we have a soul or do you believe it?
Why is it beyond the pale? How we do we know matter isn't capable of this when matter and energy is all we've observed and can observe? What else is there to go on that's actually testable? Do you think we have a full grasp on energy and matter, yet? Do you think we think we have a full grasp on energy and matter, yet?
That's a big "if." But again, we don't have the full picture by any means. And an honest scientist will admit that. However, as of now, a scientist without a religious leaning has no need to think that the mind exists without the brain. But you pose some good questions/points. It is because of how much we don't know that the will and drive is there to learn more. But should our premises be based on anything more than the natural if the natural is what we have? If there is some higher reality, will not a constant searching without religious leaning/premises eventually point in that direction? (I see it happening with certain Eastern viewpoints if anything.)I appreciated this conversation very much, and watched all the videos linked, thank you, A Thousand Words and HVN. (original post Im responding to here with both sides of convo is on this page http://hubpages.com/forum/topic/118740? … ost2545610 )
It does strike me that both sides, (not just one side) are counting on the unseen, "yet to be observed materialistically - things", to have their view. There is faith employed, that one day science minus religion WILL show us what we hope it does, to make the cases some are making. It isn't based yet, on direct science. Just pointing out that faith in science is still faith, when things have not been shown to be the case, are not observable, etc. Even applying the word "yet", shows the faith there, in something that hasn't been shown to be the case.
It needs to be pointed out also, that this "not finding the things, YET", is just as it would be, if an intelligence were behind all of this (as an explanation and actual cause), and NOT the material view. Not saying THAT in itself is a proof, but it isn't nothing, and certainly not missing for lack of looking and applying the best minds and technology to the tasks.
So my observations show that faith is faith, trust is trust. The thing trusted, if capable of what is being assigned to it, is then a good thing to trust or have faith in. If it isn't, I think it won't show it to be capable, and not because we just haven't uncovered it. It may not be able to be uncovered. That so much HAS been uncovered, and that it seems to keep on halting at particular points (In science) is very telling to me. It is nothing that we can do or have done to make these observations be the case. Whatever the truth is, just is. That is the goal to uncover, or see, or begin to see.
You said,
"I'm refuting what others are saying who are making direct statements that are not factually accurate. Like when someone says there is no soul. So, when I try to argue against that statement, or correct the factual inaccuracies, I'm then accused to trying to push my baseless speculation onto others. That is not the case. I'm trying to show that what the other person is saying IS baseless speculation.
Personally, it seems a bit beyond the pale to be so willing to assign consciousness, reason, self-awareness, intelligence, love, passion, pride, and everything else that we experience to being products of matter. We have no reason to think matter is capable of these things in all we've studied. There's nothing our brains are made of that isn't on the periodic table, no configuration or mixing of elements we're aware of, that would make matter capable of these kinds of things, yet we have no problem reducing it all down to being products of the brain because if the brain is broken it seems to break that stuff too."
I think you do a good job of sharing your views, but then also showing how others are wrong on facts and reasoning when they are, through refutation and good arguments. I think many more people can see that if they looked closely. The part about what is beyond the pale makes sense because its a simple thought really, and no one could ever show otherwise. A lot of this stuff is so self evident its hard to imagine that it has to be said at all. That we observe what we do like assigning so much to matter I think is a point of people expressing the collision (perhaps) of their held beliefs, desires and wants, with reality and a good argument. It must not be true, I think, or it just can't be true. It would be a bit too much to handle.
So its hard to watch sometimes, the good points and arguments, that are met with that you are just trying to push your baseless speculation onto others, etc, rather than pointing out the glaring problems with another persons view. To those that seem to really care to debate or argue fairly and rationally around here, thank you for that. I am quickly learning who that is, and who is just being very "anti", all the time, that no matter what is said is met with basically, "nuh-uh" and followed with another poor argument. (Almost like incessant ankle-biters, for lack of better words.) Its a tough decision to know whether to even continue to try. Btw, none of this is directed to A thousand words unless they ever do that, and I mention that because this quote is a partial response to them I think."We know that throughout life experience, especially when we're young, our minds absorb information. Our conscious mind makes it seem as if the outside world is something separate from us, and that even our own bodies are some foreign thing we have to learn along the way.
Our whole concept of reality is created by the mind using the information we collect through our senses. Physical information, physical light and sound waves, smells from sampled particles, etc, that's then stored in the brain as memories. It's through this concept built by the mind that we associate with the outside world around us. We develop our personality through interacting with reality, through learning how to appease the wants of our Id in the face of reality. So yes, damage to the brain can alter your whole concept of reality, right and wrong, memories, personality, everything. "
You keep using the word "mind" as if it's a separate entity from the brain. I need to understand your basis for this distinction. I know that you are convinced that the mind is not simply a function of the brain, but why is that? From a naturalistic perspective, there is no reason for us to think that the mind is any more than a function of the brain. What is your basis for claiming that it is separate and higher than the brain?
Animals also use their senses to perceive the world, some of them have memories similar to us, many don't, but they still interact with the world that way, they still have to make neural connections/learn, they have to be able to tell the difference between themselves, their kin, and an enemy, they have to process light, sound waves, etc... They have to see the world a certain way to live in it. And these functions are also affected by physical attributes as well as their brain makeup and if they have brain damage. But animals must have a "mind" according to your perception of it then, as well? What does it matter if you communicate if the individual on the receiving end doesn't understand it's meaning? Sure animals have less complicated language systems (as far as we know, though we're learning that whales may use syntax), but even understanding what a certain call means is the difference between life and death and would be impossible if the brain wasn't processing the meaning of it.
I'm recommending a TED talk to you. A woman named Jill Bolte Taylor spoke about her experience with a stroke and it's called "A Stroke of Insight." She talks about all the illusions you speak of. It's not really new information, but it's wonderful how her experience made her such a positive and inspiring speaker. If anything her experience adds to what we already know and to some Eastern spiritual/philosophical ideas.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UyyjU8fzEYU
"The most fascinating of findings in my mind is when the tie between the two halves of the brain is severed. Without that tie the two sides of the brain seem to work independently of one another, and can even contradict one another."
Yeah, the information is fascinating about what happens.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lfGwsAdS9Dc
To me, a really fascinating part is that he's unaware of how his mind is effected, and yet you should notice the scene where they ask him why he said music after he had pointed to the bell. His nonspeaking right brain saw bell, so he was able to point out the picture. His speaking left brain saw music, but he wasn't actually aware of this. They asked him why he said music, and his left brain came up with the reason that it was because he heard bells ringing earlier outside.
"They're statements that make claims that say we can observe the mind. Because we can put someone in an MRI or CT machine and see activity, they're saying we can 'see' the mind. And that eventually we'll be able to read/predict the mind once all the information is in because we already understand it in nature, we're now just waiting for the details to be filled in. "
Here's a video of reconstructed output from a cat's brain. We think we have good reason to hypothesize that we'll be able to see more than output at some point. The only basis that you can say this won't happen is that you think that the mind isn't solely a function of the brain. If we continue with the naturalistic view that it is, I don't see why we won't be able to.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FLb9EIiSyG8
There's also a video of people whose brain activity was reconstructed showing images of a video that had been shown and them attempting to remember it, I think. I have to find that video.
"I'm refuting what others are saying who are making direct statements that are not factually accurate. Like when someone says there is no soul. So, when I try to argue against that statement, or correct the factual inaccuracies, I'm then accused to trying to push my baseless speculation onto others. That is not the case. I'm trying to show that what the other person is saying IS baseless speculation."
How is it factual that we have a "soul?" Belief in a soul causes duality in thinking (sin nature/natural nature vs. spiritual nature) that doesn't exist if one doesn't believe in a soul. But do you know that we have a soul or do you believe it?
"Personally, it seems a bit beyond the pale to be so willing to assign consciousness, reason, self-awareness, intelligence, love, passion, pride, and everything else that we experience to being products of matter. We have no reason to think matter is capable of these things in all we've studied."
Why is it beyond the pale? How we do we know matter isn't capable of this when matter and energy is all we've observed and can observe? What else is there to go on that's actually testable? Do you think we have a full grasp on energy and matter, yet? Do you think we think we have a full grasp on energy and matter, yet?
"If there's no soul then it appears it's a mechanism that runs itself deterministically, and if there is a soul then it's a mechanism that is operated by an unseen 'driver'. "
That's a big "if." But again, we don't have the full picture by any means. And an honest scientist will admit that. However, as of now, a scientist without a religious leaning has no need to think that the mind exists without the brain. But you pose some good questions/points. It is because of how much we don't know that the will and drive is there to learn more. But should our premises be based on anything more than the natural if the natural is what we have? If there is some higher reality, will not a constant searching without religious leaning/premises eventually point in that direction? (I see it happening with certain Eastern viewpoints if anything.)First off, that poor cat! Second, thank you for sharing those links. That Jill Bolte Taylor description of her stroke was absolutely fascinating. It almost, ALMOST, makes me want to experience a stroke myself. The way I take care of myself, I may one day get that opportunity.
When I was in high school we were given a test that was designed to determine which side of the brain most dominates the way we think. Later, my guidance counselor pulled me from class to talk to me about my results because they showed that, unlike most according to her, I use both sides equally. Right down the middle. That's why I think I find the results of a severed corpus callosum so appealing, or why I found Taylor's description of the two halves of the brain and her experiences so fascinating. Because it's like she's describing what I experience. For as long as I can remember I've had this internal debate between two seemingly opposing viewpoints that very much resembles a lot of these discussions. One side only wants to deal with what can be seen/felt in this foreign world I am an individual in, the other side wants to obsess about our connectedness with each other and all of reality. Material versus spiritual, in a sense.
The mind is an inherently difficult topic because it's dealing with the purely subjective/unseeable mental scape we all experience life through. It's like trying to explain the outside of a house that you've always been inside to someone who's also never been outside of a house or seen the outside of a house themselves. It's all at once familiar and completely mysterious.
I have no issue with much of the mind being a product of the brain. The brain processes and stores physical sensory information. Sights are physical light particles processed by the eyes, smells are physical particles analyzed and processed by our olfactory sensors, sounds are physical waves in the air causing physical responses in the components of our ears. This physical information is stored in, and can be recalled from, a physical brain. It's through these capabilities that we associate and interact with the physical world around us. So it's no surprise that damage to or manipulation of the brain can have adverse affects on that mental experience.
And this is no different than other species of animal. I recognize and understand the brains we have evolved from the same animal kingdom that others have, and share many of the same capabilities. Everything we experience in the mind, everything we think/remember/feel/imagine, that's the brain. For us to experience it there has to be a physical cause. If you feel a physical sensation in your stomach when you're nervous, there is corresponding physical activity going on in the brain. I get that and am not arguing that.
But where it starts getting interesting is in the actually being nervous part. Like approaching someone you like for the first time, trying to muster the courage to ask them out. Ultimately, it's still all just matter, right? Neurons firing, signals sending and receiving, that give you that sensation. But what caused these to begin? Your apprehension about asking this person out. Your fears of rejection, or of being embarrassed. So at what point does matter begin to care how others perceive it? I mean, I get the feeling being there as a possible warning signal of potential danger from a survival standpoint, but this isn't about survival. This is about pride and self-confidence and self-image. This is the ego trying to moderate between the wants of the Id and reality.
It's one thing to assign functions of the brain to what we experience in the mind. But it's quite another to so flippantly assign what makes the "I" in the mind what it is to the purely material brain. The "I" that actually employs these capabilities of the brain, that actually recalls the memories, imagines the potential outcomes, and then decides what course of action to take. We, in each moment, create our reality by the choices we make. In doing so we steer these brain functions willfully. Our willful actions determine our experiences, which them feed back into our brains as information, which means what we do actually determines what our brain becomes, ultimately.
How we do we know matter isn't capable of this when matter and energy is all we've observed and can observe? What else is there to go on that's actually testable? Do you think we have a full grasp on energy and matter, yet? Do you think we think we have a full grasp on energy and matter, yet?
These are good questions. Right now all we know and understand about matter is from a purely material mindset. We look at it as a purely material thing. We break it down to its component parts. The subatomic particles that make it behave as it does. Yet in all of that digging there's not anything yet to suggest these components, when found in the right combinations or mixtures, can exhibit a will. And if it does ultimately turn out to be that matter and energy are actually capable of all of this, can we really at that point continue to think of matter as nothing more than just the unintended product of a purely causal universe?
Life is still as mysterious today as it has ever been, and it's not for a lack of looking. If there were some non-material explanation behind it, and we only employed material approaches and methods to understand it, then it would continue to remain an unsolved mystery. So do we put our faith in the people on the forefront of investigation and just wait for an answer? An answer that, if ever, will most likely be long after you and I are gone? Because that's ultimately what we're doing. We're putting our faith somewhere in regards to what's not yet understood based on our philosophical leanings, ultimately.
"How is it factual that we have a "soul?""
It's not. My point is that others here were making the statement that we DON'T have a soul, as if their statement IS factual. That's what I was originally addressing. That neither can be said factually.
"But should our premises be based on anything more than the natural if the natural is what we have? If there is some higher reality, will not a constant searching without religious leaning/premises eventually point in that direction?"
This is what I'm often trying to get across. That if a purely naturalist/materialist set of conditions cause us to toss out or not even entertain possibilities that go beyond that, then no I don't think constant searching will eventually point in that direction. Because we're defining before we even get there what's possible and what isn't. If all we conceive as possible is only what we know reality to be capable of today, then that's all we'll ever know. Or, put more eloquently ...
"Imagination is more important than knowledge. For knowledge is limited to all we now know and understand, while imagination embraces the entire world, and all there ever will be to know and understand." - Albert Einstein"These are good questions. Right now all we know and understand about matter is from a purely material mindset. We look at it as a purely material thing. We break it down to its component parts. The subatomic particles that make it behave as it does. Yet in all of that digging there's not anything yet to suggest these components, when found in the right combinations or mixtures, can exhibit a will. And if it does ultimately turn out to be that matter and energy are actually capable of all of this, can we really at that point continue to think of matter as nothing more than just the unintended product of a purely causal universe?"
Scientists and philosophers alike have been searching for the origins of consciousness for millennia. But the answers are fairly obvious from a materialist perspective.
There must be a natural process that creates conscious life from non-living substances. This is what is known as abiogenesis. But the actual processes that took place at any particular time are not known. This puts science at a disadvantage. Though there is no shame in saying we don’t know, we are charged with assuming something that sounds almost unrealistic. We are accused of putting faith in a process we don’t understand, and I don’t think we have to be in that position with what we already know.
What I want to do is address this from the top down. That is to say. I want to start from how and why humans and other biological forms are conscious, and move down to the processes that make it all possible.
Why and how is a human being conscious?
The first component is that all biological forms have needs, and we’ll be talking about them a lot. We also have limited sensory apparatus that give us a perspective of all that is outside of ourselves. We have bodies, which are a compilation of cells which are going through their own life cycle.
These features isolate us from the outside world and give us a sense of self. But the self would not exist but for one specific feature: A memory. Without a memory there is no continuity. With a memory there is a personal history.
So human consciousness depends on physical components, in conjunction with our specific needs.
The brain was developed in response to the needs of groups of cells. It co-ordinates the cells for movement, this allows them to get food, which is required for replenishing energy that allows the processes of replacing and maintaining the cells, as all our body functions including procreation.
Only things that move need brains. Plants don’t need them because they don’t have to go anywhere for food or for any other reason. There is a plant/like called a sea squirt that has tadpoles.
These little critters have a brain that allows them to swim until they can find a place to take root. When they find a place to stay they absorb their brain. They no longer need it as from then on they stay rooted in one spot.
Needs are the driving force for biology. Needs are stimulus and without the requirement that our eyes are moist, we wouldn’t even blink. Everything we do, including writing papers on consciousness and agreeing or disagreeing with them is due to stimulus. We do nothing at all without it, there is no need. You don’t scratch if you don’t itch.
But what about lower animals? They don’t have the same kind of consciousness that we do. We say they live on instinct. What is instinct? It is in essence, automatic responses.
In humans we know that below the conscious is the subconscious. This subconscious is actually instinct. That is to say it functions on automatic. We have all heard of flight or fight response.
The subconscious is where our emotions come from. They emote us. They force us to do. They are a physical manifestation of our needs, along with a readymade response. You feel hunger, you know you need food, and you search for a source.
Conscious deliberation is too slow. Someone throws a ball at me. I see it and I think, oh my, should I duck or try to catch it? By the time I say: “Oh my” the ball has hit me in the eye. Neurology has shown that the brain responds often seconds before the conscious mind even knows it is going to react. How it reacts depends on how it has been taught to react, and the job of consciousness is to educate the subconscious before it needs to react.
Ask a martial arts master if they are deliberating while executing one amazing move after another, anticipating their opponents next moves. The answer is no. Time for deliberation is before the action starts: the training. When fighting, one is on automatic response.
In fact anything done well, any skill, is usually done on automatic, with the consciousness looking on as quality control almost as if it is a third party.
All animals have to have some self awareness. Again, basic hunger makes an animal aware of self. It may think of itself in anything like the same way we do, or it might. But that’s not important for this discussion. The point being that even a single celled animal has needs and preferences, and needs a certain kind of rudimentary self awareness not to keep hitting it’s head on the same grain of sand trying to get at food on the other side.
A single cell does not have a brain as such, but it has instinct/automatic responses.
So we can say, and some have, that consciousness is an emergent property of instinct and self awareness. The more complex the groups of cells creating an individual, and the more complex the individuals needs, the more complex consciousness. The complexities have to develop together through natural selection over time.
What really spurned on human consciousness was complex language. But that’s a part of the subject that has been well written about and studied.
But this is biology. The animate. How does the inanimate become animate? How does awareness and instinct come from the inanimate?
For this we will start from the bottom up and hopefully meet in the middle.
Atoms are small bits of energy/matter. They follow very strict rules. That is to say their nature is very specific.
There is one law that starts the process of creation very literally: every atom has to try to maintain or reach it’s lowest possible level of energy output. These are the laws of energy conservation.
What this nature does is forces atoms try to always find their lowest output of energy. When atoms interact their energy output usually rises. F an atom catches a stray electron it’s energy output rises and it flings the electron away from itself. If another atom catches it, it flings it back. In this way atoms get caught in a game of atomic hot potato.
At this point they are merged. Their merger creates a new substance which has its own characteristics and nature. The two atoms then find the lowest possible output of energy between them.
These mergers between atoms happen in various ways and with various results depending which atoms are interacting, and they produce chemicals on our level of existence.
Chemicals in turn form complex compounds that have their own natures.
In a very real way, automatic responses of an atom are exactly like response to needs. These needs are brought on by the laws of conservation of energy. These laws are the nature of energy/matter.
Everything and everyone is made from atoms. Cells are groups of atoms in a particular configuration. Everything follows the laws of physics, and thereby the laws of the nature of energy/matter. So below, so above.
Therefore, automatic response is the forerunner to instinct/subconscious, and the conscious is an emergent property of instinct/subconscious. Each is a more complex form of the other. Each is the same thing in a more complex form, produced by increasingly complex forms of existence.
We don’t know the details of how biology formed, but it did form quickly. We know that amino acids are formed naturally under many conditions. The form spontaneously in experiments done to replicate what we think was earths early conditions. We have found them on space.
These are the building blocks of life, as they say. DNA and RNA are made of them. It is my contention that the nature of the inanimate and the nature of the animate is the same.
Atoms are anything but inanimate.
Needs in humans are felt. Yet we wouldn’t say an atom feels the need to lower it’s output of energy. But in a sense it does. It responds to stimulus. Stimulus is information. Whether it feels that information or not, it responds to it automatically because it has to.
We feel our needs. They are information and stimulus. We are forced to respond to them. Even inaction is action.
We have will. But our will is a manifestation of our conditioning: both genetic and environmental, and how they play off each other. That makes it a unique will, though not a free one in any other sense.
This feeling or noticing of information is awareness. So again, a form of rudimentary awareness seems to be inherent in everything. That awareness in a more complex being like ourselves, coupled with instinct/the subconscious, a sense of self through isolation, a human brain and a memory, all driven by needs/stimulus, and the need to fulfill those needs, create consciousness and full self-awareness.
(needs demand to be resolved. Needs are conflict, which demands resolution. Conflict is the mother of creativity. No need? Then there is no need for creativity.)
Is it really that the inanimate created the animate? That life came from nonlife? (abiogenesis)
I think there is a real case to be made for changing our definition of life. In a sense there is nothing but life. I’ve written about this before. On the other hand one could make a case for there being nothing but auto response.
In a sense they are both the same thing from a different perspective.That's an interesting take, to say that there is no inanimate, only animate, considering atoms are never really inactive. And it's this very same kind of reasoning that leads me ultimately to the concept of a free will. Not to shift the conversation too harshly. I just want to point this out while we're here, but will get back on topic.
In my view the formation of life, while entirely causal, is no accident. Like the law of conservation you speak of. It's the laws, those unbendable/unbreakable laws that shape everything we know. The fact that we're capable of defining these laws based on observations of matter/energy is a testament to the consistency in which matter/energy conforms.
Now, think about that told in a really primitive story form, before we started applying fancy titles to things. A natural world that forms completely, shaped by how the laws that govern it are defined. Then, that same law-maker, makes one thing that can break one of its laws. It says zig and always zig, but this thing zagged. This is what I keep running into. No matter how much we learn, how well we understand, the primary theme of this 3000+ year old story is relevant.
But going back to what you're saying. I get the idea, about each thing boiling down to an original. Like consciousness being a more evolved form of instinct which is a more evolved form of response to stimuli in simple cells. Everything evolving from conservation of energy, to always anabolize just enough to stay ahead of how much it needs to catabolize. And in much the same way, what I'm trying to elude to in a lot of these conversations (when I'm not talking about the bible) boils down that very same way. We're often talking about the more evolved counterparts, but each of those components devolve back down to some inherent need of some kind.
What's the propelling force in the nature behind all matter/energy. Like life in particular, which is where the mind ultimately springs from. Biologically, an organism is defined as 'alive' if it exhibits the following traits ...
Homeostasis - Regulation of the internal environment to maintain a constant state.
Organization - Being structurally composed of one or more cells, which are the basic units of life.
Metabolism- Transformation of energy by converting chemicals and energy into cellular components (anabolism) and decomposing organic matter (catabolism).
Growth - Maintenance of a higher rate of anabolism than catabolism.
Adaptation - The ability to change over time in response to the environment.
Response to Stimuli - A response can take many forms, from the contraction of a unicellular organism to external chemicals, to complex reactions involving all the senses of multicellular organisms.
Reproduction - The ability to produce new individual organisms, either asexually from a single parent organism, or sexually from two parent organisms.
That's the best definition we have of life. In dictionary terms it's defined as "The property or quality that distinguishes living organisms from dead organisms and inanimate matter, manifested in functions such as metabolism, growth, reproduction, and response to stimuli or adaptation to the environment originating from within the organism."
Like you said, even inanimate matter isn't technically inanimate. The whole universe in fact, and everything in it, has a shelf life. It's all going through evolutionary phases, from one form to another, until it reaches its last. Nothing is still. It inflated out of seemingly nowhere, somehow beyond its natural tendency to collapse back in, sputtering out these globs of matter all along the way that eventually became us. It's all a ripple. Always moving, until its done.
For any of it to happen, it has to be compelled. For life to be life it has to maintain growth and it has to actively acquire the energy it needs to burn to acquire more energy. Life had to be compelled to be pushed through and shaped by the teeth of evolution.
I'm all for the idea that the mind is wholly and completely the product of a material brain. But if that is indeed the case, it would seem that raises some significant questions about the nature of matter. When speaking of other forms of life, other species, you have to qualify each thing about their mind as 'we think', or 'we assume', because the mind cannot be seen. We don't know if all things have some level of consciousness or not. Or what level of awareness one has over another, if any. The only reason we know its there is because we experience it. A purely material process forming the mind as we experience it, means there are some pretty significant characteristics behind the behaviors of matter/energy that are still to this day completely invisible to our scientific eye. Behaviors that could permeate throughout all matter and energy in some form or another with no way to date to detect it or measure it in any way.
To call something a "soul" is to apply an age-old name to an age-old concept. Outdated. But what would you call something like this way back then when we didn't have all the scienc-y names applied to everything. Does that mean there is no soul? Or does that mean our concept of what a 'soul' is is so tethered to a particular idea that when the real thing can be observed, we don't recognize it as being the same thing? What if consciousness is the soul? What if life itself is the soul?Just one thing before I respond to the entire answer, which may take a day or so.
We can't do anything that is against our nature. What ever we do is because of our nature. We can't break the natural laws because we are the natural laws.
Again, you gave me a perfect definition of free will: Separate from the will of god.
Well I know that will is a manifestation of our conditioning and predisposition. It is certainly unique to us and makes it possible for all of s to act in ways other would not act. But even though we can technically do anything anyone can do, we really can't. We each have a limited range of possible choices specific to who we are, which is our predisposition and conditioning.
So this will is perfectly in line with what I outlined and is created by the processes I talked about. It is not free in any other sense than that is unique to us and separate from the will of others.
But it is not separate from the laws of physics and it can not break those laws. So as an analogy, if those laws are the manifestation of the will of god, it is not separate from that will.To say we do not have free will is to answer the free will versus determinism debate that still has no concrete resolution. Both agree the mind provides options, weighs pros and cons, draws on past experiences, imagines potential outcomes. The difference is to the determinist the choice we make in any given moment is the only choice we physically could have. That the alternate options provided by the mind only make it seem as if we had a choice, when actually it was determined. It would be, as you said, unnatural to be able to choose one of those other choices. If our choices are determined by a physical brain adhering to physical law, then that's all we can be. Conscious but passive observes under the illusion of being in control.
You're right in that we can not break the laws of physics. We're physical beings and our physical selves must adhere. But the mind isn't really material. It's abstract. It's the immaterial product of a material brain. And it's really our abstract thoughts and ideas and decisions that ultimately determine what physical action is carried out. What if the mind, being an abstract, makes possible freedom from natural law? I mean, we still can't defy gravity and fall up. And we certainly have our base/instinctive behaviors. But we can determine, in a particular moment, what choice to make or path to take.
Yes, we are conditioned. Most times the things we do are habits and routines etched out of the interplay between what we want/need and what is realistically possible. Like muscle memory, you consciously make a choice to do something, and when you do it enough it becomes automatic. Conscious thought can take a back seat for that particular task, or can focus on something else. But we can also consciously override if we choose. We can decide to break a habit or a routine. It's difficult. Some more than others. But it is possible to decide to maintain the resolve, and in each of those moments that you usually continue the habit, you consciously override. Do it enough and the habit is broken and no longer takes the same level of conscious effort to refrain. If we can really do this, then our immaterial minds and wills can actually determine the actions of a physical mass of matter separate from natural law. We can actually determine our own behavior.Have we determined our own behavior or have we determined the behavior that evolution has given us. Can any of us have thoughts that determine behavior that is separate from humanities?
If that were true, we would never be able to monitor the brains activity. We would never understand anything about the brain.
We can monitor brain activity because it is physical activity. But the only way we can associate that physical activity to mental activity is through interactions with the subject because we cannot observe their mind.
I'm not sure how many times we need to go over this? Technicians and Doctors can in fact predict what actions the mind is doing. We can observe the mind because it's a function or product of the physical brain. IQ tests are measures of the ability of the mind to preform tasks. The mind is not akin to the soul where the soul isn't measurable or detectable and is abstract. The mind is not a thought or an idea (abstract) but creates abstract thoughts and is detectable and measurable.
I guess we'll have to keep going over this until you all get it right. (Right here is where I'd use an emoticon to signify I'm 'jesting' you, but since I can't bring myself to use emoticons I instead have to explain it in parenthesis).
The only reason a technician or doctor could possibly predict what actions a mind is doing is because of past statistics gathered by observing brain activity and then comparing that to the corresponding answers a subject gives regarding what's going on in their mind at that time. In the case of an IQ test, you're giving a subject a test and then judging their mental capability based on their responses. The mind is not observable. There's always a subjective layer that requires input from the subject. Just observing and measuring brain activity alone tells us nothing without it.An IQ test tells us nothing about the brain and or mind? An MRI tells us nothing about the activity of the mind? Does it matter that previous research had to be done to help us map the brain and it's thoughts and activity. Using this reasoning we can deduce we know nothing about the universe or our own bodies as you are not allowing previous research. Do we know nothing about aeronautics because we are not allowed to use previous research? The fact is the mind is not abstract as it's not simply a thought or an idea, it can be measured and detected. Claiming the brain abstract is to claim that a function of the brain is a thought or an idea when that function of the brain is to form thoughts and ideas.
I'm just trying to point out what should be obvious and certainly not worth this level of discussion. Any neurologist would tell you the same thing I am. But I've found it to be a pretty common thing in these discussions that neuroscience seems to be a real point of confusion for a whole lot of people. So, I'll try again.
Yes, we're able to map out what areas of the brain are attributed to specific functions of the mind, but gathering that data always requires input from the subject as far as what's actually going on in their mind BECAUSE the mind is not observable. I didn't say anything about not being allowed to use previous research. I'm simply pointing out the subjective element involved in the process of gathering that previous research. Gathering that information required input from the subjects because what was going on in their mind could not be objectively observed and verified.
All we can see from the outside is brain activity. Yes, where that brain activity occurs, when one refers to that mapped out statistical information, one can make better informed predictions about what mental activity specific brain activities are associated with.
The subjective/unobservable nature of the mind is the primary reason there's a whole other branch of science outside of the natural sciences; behavioral science. If the mind were observable court cases regarding perjury or intellectual property wouldn't be necessary. In fact, a major element of the human condition in general is our inability to simply see the mind of another. Instead we have to depend on clunky language to try to convey abstract ideas and concepts that often aren't so easily put into words.http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Measuring_the_Mind
https://www.aclu.org/blog/technology-an … etect-lies
http://www.scientificamerican.com/artic … ing-about/
You see the mind is observable, detectable, measurable, predictable and testable. It's not an abstract thought or idea as you claim.
From the last link.
"They can now even reconstruct videos of what a person has watched based on their brain activity alone. Cornell University cognitive neuroscientist Nathan Spreng and his colleagues wanted to carry this research one step further by seeing if they could deduce the mental pictures of people that subjects conjure up in their heads."
One thing I notice, is some are arguing with a self held rigid definition in place, of what the brain and mind can even be allowed to be. It is a sure way to "win," but not really, actually win this debate.
Brain activity IS the mind and it can be observed and measured, and it tells scientists a great deal about how the brain works. It's called neuroscience.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/NeuroscienceFrom the link.
"At the cognitive level, cognitive neuroscience addresses the questions of how psychological functions are produced by neural circuitry. The emergence of powerful new measurement techniques such as neuroimaging (e.g., fMRI, PET, SPECT), electrophysiology, and human genetic analysis combined with sophisticated experimental techniques from cognitive psychology allows neuroscientists and psychologists to address abstract questions such as how human cognition and emotion are mapped to specific neural substrates."
An even better example, of an insisted up definition of the mind, and then claiming to make a case. The added suggestion that neuroscience backs this up is interesting.
This kind of thing is a classic example of debating or discussing in a sophomoric manner. Sadly, something I see far too often. Not just using this post as the example, but many surrounding ones, to be fair.
Its a manner of rigging the game to win, plain and simple. If the definition OF the mind IS just the brain, then what is to discuss!? We can all go home now! And this is me, being so mean for seeing it for what it is.The brain is actually the physical blob of goo in our heads, while the mind is the activity of the brain, the neurons firing.
I agree. I would find it much more likely and real to say that it is the pattern of neuron interconnectivity that is the mind. Certainly it seems that it is that pattern that determines memory...
Sometimes the whole is greater than the sum of it's parts.
Look at a termite colony. It's a perfect example of this.Where and how is that pattern stored? How is it retrieved? There is no true explanation for that. There MIGHT be, but not one they've found so far.
Those are facts. Look up the definitions of brain and mind.
I know what YOUR definitions are. Mine are different.
I think for myself. I don't accept every conclusion that scientists make, or base my opinions on popular belief.
Just because scientists and people like Dawkins think we are meat robots doesn't mean I have to agree with that.
I know I am not a meat robot, I have thoughts and consciousness and a soul. I have personal experience that proves to me there is more going on than what scientists say.
Conciousness is more than neurons firing in the brain.
I don't blindly accept things.No, not when they are wrong.
Do you actually think WE have all of our definitions correct? Do we know everything? Do scientists know everything? Are scientists ever WRONG?Do we know everything? No.
In order to communicate properly and effectively we have to agree on the meaning of words. If not we may as well be speaking different languages. You can't just change the definition of words and expect others to understand you.
Ball - a solid or hollow sphere or ovoid, esp. one that is kicked, thrown, or hit in a game.
You don't get to say a ball have 4 corners.So people shouldn't disagree on things?
I should just accept YOUR definition, so life is easier ?Do you have other definitions from a different dictionary. You can't just make up definitions, we can disagree on many things but words mean is not one of them.
Sure words can have different meanings to different people.
Word definitions can be wrong.
That's what I'm getting at.
YOUR definition of "mind" and "consciousness" is what's up for debate.consciousness- the ability to be aware of the surrounding environment through physical receivers of the body, which are then processed in the brain in a yet unknown manner.
MY definitions are adaptable, as new information is received.Consciousness - the state of being awake and aware of one's surroundings: she failed to regain consciousness and died two days later.
• the awareness or perception of something by a person: her acute consciousness of Mike's presence.
• the fact of awareness by the mind of itself and the world: consciousness emerges from the operations of the brain.
Where did you get your definition? If you make up your own all communication breaks down.I just said it was my definition.
Communication only breaks down because YOU refuse to admit you might be wrong.
How is my definition incorrect?
My definition says that we don't know how it works.
Do you honestly think we KNOW how consciousness works?Sorry, as I've explained you can't make up your own definitions of words and expect to have a conversation with someone who has used a standard English definition.
"physical receivers of the body" What are those?
And what's wrong with the standard definitions? It describes what it is and doesn't discuss our understanding of it. For that you'll have to go to a book.
As I said you can't start claiming a ball is described as having four sides.I think you are capable of figuring out that I was referring to the eyes, ears, nose, nerves and other parts of our bodies that receive information from our environment.
Furthermore, I don't know what word to use for those things. I would automatically think "senses" but that would be inadequate, as an eye isn't a sense, etc.
If you know of a word, feel free to tell me. Perhaps "sense organ"?Perhaps using an already established definition will do. You may not like it, but at least we can understand what we are talking about.
Sorry, I think I'll stick with the dictionaries definition. Have you made up any other definitions?
Consciousness is in a sense based on an illusion. The illusion of a solid “I”.
There are trillions of atoms in your body and all of them have changed over your life sometimes two or times depending on your age. Its a sort of constant reincarnation as energy leaves and joins other systems, to be replaced by new energy.
Every cell of the body has been replaced by age 7 and they continue to be replaced as long as you live. You are not the same person you were when you were a few years younger. In fact, you are not the exact same person from one moment to the next. The system keeps changing.
The only thing that gives continuity to the idea of “I” is the memory of the system’s past history.
Consciousness is obsessed with the “I” Now, obviously the system that is you is an individual dynamic system. But the sense of self and self identify is a kind of illusion.
On the atomic scale you would be hard pressed to tell where you end and the outside world begins. There is more space in us than mass.
Life exists in layers: the atomic, the chemical, the cellular and this one, the world we see and experience.
Our sensory array is limited and can’t see or sense the other layers. So it gives an illusion of solidity, and isolation. This is part of what is required to create consciousness, that isolation.
Memory is also required. Without it there is no history of the system and no chance of “I” emerging.
But the driving force in all of this is need. This is why I have always maintained that AI (artificial intelligence) won’t get anywhere substantial until we give it needs. This might well include pain and fear and the understanding of termination as something to be avoided at all costs, as well as the ability to be mobile and the need to be mobile.
Needs are essential, because without the need to do something, there is no need and no impetus to do it.
Needs that demand to be resolved, isolation, the illusion of solidity, and memory of personal history creates awareness of self and personal identity.
This identity is dynamic and prone to change. Our personalities can alter depending who we are interacting with. But for the most part people have no problem blending these personalities under the one umbrella. They are all familiar and all part of “I”. However when things go wrong people can become bipolar and even schizophrenic and isolate personalities and identities, seemingly developing multi separate personalities and identities.Actually, I pretty much agree with that in it's entirety. I just take it a lot farther.
I see the entire universe as an entity. I call it God. We evolve from one state of consciousness to the next in a long process that starts at the Big Bang (sort of, I will just use that term for the moment) Starting with almost pure energy, with a small amount of form. Energy interacts with fields. Fields are formative. The energy interacts with the field, producing matter and consciousness. The Universe slowly evolves, based on a predetermined pattern. Consciousness is at every stage of formation, growing stronger as the universe evolves. The consciousness of the Universe is at the stage of "human" now. I expect the pattern to form even higher levels of consciousness. Eventually, the pattern goes in the reverse direction, and the process starts over again.
Word definitions are never wrong, they are just common usage of words and common definitions.That said science and philosophy do change the meanings of words or use common words for uncommon meaning. Like using the word nothing to mean something, as in the world came from nothing when they mean quantum fluctuation which is anything but nothing, or using the word disorder when talking about entropy when energy balances so it can no longer do work in a system, when that is actually all about order.
So you are both right
There. That doesn't happen often.Sure, if they are the type of people who define words to suit their own agendas.
That's very funny.This irony expressed here, just about knocked me over!
Well, if you wish to use the common definitions of words that every one else uses, then yes, life will be easier. But, if you wish instead to make up your own definitions, no one is going to know what you're talking about and your arguments will fail, as they do here.
Of course, we already know you don't make up your own definitions to words, or else your posts here would be complete word salad gibberish and no one would respond to you.
What definition would you give for the mind? What's your basis for that definition? What's the basis for any definition? Should both supernatural and natural bases be weighed the same or does one have more weight than another? Why?
When a woman of the voodoo religion has a child sick with malaria, a secular/non-voodoo doctor would tell her the girl is sick because a mosquito carrying malaria bit her thus infecting her. The voodoo woman would say that he was wrong and that sickness is caused by/a result of magic and the little girl is sick because someone cursed her. Which explanation has more weight and why? No one's disrespecting the woman's right to believe that her daughter's been cursed if that is what her religion teaches, BUT science says differently, and it can actually treat malaria based on what can be physically observed.
We have no scientific reason to see the mind as anything more than a function of the brain. The more you learn not just about the human brain, but non-human animal brains, and also about commonly observed evolutionary processes even and inferences made based on sound science, you come to understand more about it. Maybe one day science will show that there is more, but until it does, the only definition that matters is one that can be observed and where natural perspective says "hey, we've got a pretty likely, plausible way to explain that." Otherwise why should we omit any other religious spiritual reasons/definitions/explanations?
Does your soul leave your body every time you sneeze?
If you step on a crack, will you break your mother's back?
Will knocking over salt give you bad luck?
Does your hand itch because will you get some money?
Is menstruation a sickness that makes you unholy?
Why should your answers to these questions outweigh the answers of people that genuinely believe otherwise? If you truly didn't believe there was a reason, you'd be willing to believe that any answer was true. But you don't why? Based on "blind" belief that the answers are right or that a decent natural explanation is the most logical one?consciousness- the ability to be aware of the surrounding environment through physical receivers of the body, which are then processed in the brain in a yet unknown manner.
This is the answer I already gave earlier in this thread.
I don't believe in the supernatural. I think everything is natural and has an explanation.
I don't think that science is capable of explaining everything. I think there are some things that can only be understood intuitively.
I don't think I'm "right" or that someone else is wrong. I adapt my beliefs to new information, or change them altogether if it is necessary.False. You do believe you are right. Otherwise you would admit that our definition of the mind could be true because you could be wrong. But based on your own presuppositions and perspective and your responses, you are quite convinced that this definition is the correct one and that Dr. Lamb (Or ED)'s is wrong, no?
No. I am always willing to admit that I am wrong.
I do that all the time as I gain more information. I am adaptable.Whether you are adaptable in the future says nothing about right now. Right now you believe you are right and Dr. Lamb, ED, and I are wrong. I'm all about gray areas, but that's pretty black and white. Don't fret, we also think you are wrong. That's why/how people have differing views. I'm quite adaptable myself in certain ways. In certain ways I am not. Like anyone else.
"I don't believe in the supernatural. I think everything is natural and has an explanation."
Why?
"I don't think that science is capable of explaining everything. I think there are some things that can only be understood intuitively."
Why? All science is is a natural explanation. If you believe everything has a natural explanation, why don't you trust that science can find it? That seems counter-intuitive, oddly enough. Also, what is intuition and why do you trust it?Why?
I believe everything has a natural explanation, because the Universe appears to be a closed system.
I don't believe science can explain everything, because of the method that is used. It excludes intuition. I don't know exactly what intuition is, but it is whatever factor is responsible for providing knowledge directly into our minds. I am currently formulating an idea.I disagree strongly that science excludes intuition. Intuition and imagination are what fuels it. But NOT what determines it. For example, a scientist or behavioral scientist may have a gut feeling that an opinion they have is true. They're excited! They do hours/years of tests and hours/years of research and sometimes they're right or on the right track, and sometimes they're way off. Intuition can't be the only thing. Imagination can't be the only thing. But they are certainly factors.
White people used to fear black people. For them it was intuitive when a black person was around to guard or protect their spouse or child, because their inner voice said black=dangerous. Then it turns out they were wrong. Should they still trust their gut when the evidence says differently? I am a black person. I'm not dangerous. Most of the black people I know aren't dangerous. Intuition can't always be trusted.You're talking about mild, common intuition, gut feelings.
I am talking about information coming directly into our minds. It appears to come from elsewhere, but I don't think it actually does. I think it comes when we are minds are flowing into a new form or paradigm. Some people think of this as moments of raised consciousness.
Just look up the definition if you don't know what it is.
Intuition - the ability to understand something immediately, without the need for conscious reasoning: we shall allow our intuition to guide us.
• a thing that one knows or considers likely from instinctive feeling rather than conscious reasoning: your insights and intuitions as a native speaker are positively sought.
If you were in fact open minded you'd be open to these definitions and science.Here is something else we all have experienced, Intuition. A scientist cannot observe it, the material nature of it, because it isn't material.
Yes. Now what? (Not being snarky there
)
You aren't going to tell me you can observe the material nature of my Subconscious too, are you? In case you can, can you tell me what color it is, how much it weighs, and it's proportions?Perhaps, you still don't know what we're talking about here. Observing the nature of something does not necessarily mean it will have the same physical properties as other things. While the brain may have weight and color, neurons firing may not, yet they can still be observed.
Electrical activity can be measured. Consciousness, probably not.
Sure they can. They ask questions. Can you see my fingers? How are you feeling? What's your name?
People who are not conscious don't usually answer any of them. Those conscious people who do answer show that they are conscious by answering.
Depending how they answer tells us whether they are delusional or not.
You can learn a lot about a persons state of consciousness and state of mind by talking to them.
Since we are all human we share traits, so we can guess what people are really thinking just by subliminal cues at times. Psychics are often good at that, even if they are not actually psychic.
But the best way to prove a person is conscious is by watching what they do: their behavior.Is anyone disputing, in this whole forum, that a STATE of consciousness can be observed?
I don't think there is a single person here that would dispute that idea. Of course the state of a person's consciousness CAN be observed. That is not what is being talked about when we are discussing the mind however, or the other definition of consciousness.
It is like thinking a point is made, when it makes another case that no one has made. Swiping out definitions. (I have seen others do this, and not sure for sure, that you are doing this here. If you are though, then you are.)There is no separation between mind and brain or mind and consciousness.
That might be true, and if it is, then the arguments supporting those ideas will have no holes or errors in logic when fleshing out the ideas.
This is why it's not being mean or "nitpicky" for me or others to point out possible illogic, or where an idea doesn't match up with our experiences. Facts or reasoning. I welcome this as well. An idea has to carry through or the idea may not be a good one.People that understand science also understand that ones personal experiences are entirely irrelevant to science. The reason for that is because many scientific theories are "counter-intuitive", which means that the universe behaves very differently than how we might think it does and especially differently than our personal experiences. That is why those "ideas" don't match up with our experiences.
Well then make a logical argument against it.
To this, when you said, " There is no separation between mind and brain or mind and consciousness."?
That was your claim though, and an argument has to be made to support such a claim. This is what we have been doing for a week now almost? Many have given points in arguments and this where we see the playing out of the winning or losing arguments/points.
Just saying it doesn't make the argument , and I'm certainly not sayin that is what you are doing here. We can discuss it though. I just don't know how closely you have been following or not.So what is the argument against it? I've been making arguments for it for several days.
And I have been responding to some of your points. I have laid out my views on all of this stuff over the last several days as well. Did you have any issues with what I have said in particular?
So you stand by the idea that to observe a persons STATE of consciousness, like doctors do in trauma wards, MAKES a case that consciousness as we have been discussing is observable?
I was pointing out that these are two different things. This was why I was kind of asking about that not assuming.
Clutching at straws here: is it not more correct to say the effect of neurons firing can be observed? In the same that the effect of the passage of an electron can be seen but not the electron itself.
What is silly is to think that observable necessarily means seen and that concrete means physical.
Real things, concrete things, are things that are observable. Abstract things, or unreal things, are not observable in any way.
Not being able to see something doesn't mean it can't be observed. Not being able to observe something, however, means that it's not real, it's an abstract idea.
I take you back to the wind example. It is only observable by it's interaction with other things. It can't be seen, but it IS observable... so it's concrete. Wind exists as more than an idea.
Once again, we go back to making something up in abstract, giving it the same name as something concrete, and then saying that it is not observable in either form.
Drama.If we compare the wind to the mind, we can see some differences. Wind can be felt and experienced with our senses other than sight. The speed of wind can be measured with instruments. We don't have examples like those with the mind in how we observe it. It keeps looking and behaving like a non material "thing", that we keep on absolutely experiencing.
"An MRI scan of the head can also determine the cause of:
Muscle weakness or numbness and tingling
Changes in thinking or behavior
Hearing loss
Headaches when certain other symptoms or signs are present
Speaking difficulties
Vision problems "
http://www.nlm.nih.gov/medlineplus/ency … 003791.htm
Some good points there. taking another angle from those points, we are seeing or observing effects of something that seems to absolutely exist, that can't be observed with either our five senses. Or anything else. It's our everyday experience though, and not material.
Which brings us back to the original point, or in part, that non material and non Physical things can exist, if they do. We apprehend these things through observation and how the thing reveals itself. I could be wrong, and open to the discussion showing otherwise.
Sometimes, a thing doesn't have physical properties though, because it ISN'T physical. Sometimes a thing doesn't have material properties, because it actually isn't material at all.
The following is in general, to those to whom it applies:
Nothing that has been proposed, justifies insisting something with no physical or material properties, to be something physical or material. It doesn't make any sense. Can we be such slaves to a worldview even if/when it fails us? Why not drop the view in favor of one that lines up more with observable science, experience, and reality, the facts? Why not drop that part of a view, and see it as a clue to truth and reality of our universe? I mean when it bucks up against reality SO hard?If it doesn't have any physical properties or is based on physical properties, then it probably doesn't exist.
Which is just as the materialist worldview would dictate. That view, in action.
Materialist worldview?
It's called "reality" - fyi.As long as you are aware of that view's shortcomings as they make themselves known. This is really what we are all doing here. You and I choose and hold views, and they work or not. Just saying things doesn't make them true.
Don't be so put off by the word "worldview." It simply means the way we view our world. We all have one.Such as what shortcomings? That reality doesn't acknowledge gods, spirits, souls and other imaginary things?
Your "worldview" is based on faith and beliefs, which are often wrong in light of reality, facts and evidence.I didn't mean that to sound as personal as it maybe came across, as most all worldviews have some shortcomings. The way truth works, not all can be right, and very few to one (ultimately) can be right , unless that worldview includes relativism as part of its reality.
As for your opinions and beliefs about my worldview, you are entitled to them, but if they fail as it sometimes turns out, then they fail. I try to critique my own and others as the points come up in these discussions.
My point before was to show how sometimes are speaking OUT of their chosen view, it seems, rather than responding reasonably to the facts and good reasoning given. This is where I can see people employing faith sometimes to help keep a view viable, or using simple dismissal or denial. Or I sometimes see answers given for what turns out to be a different argument that isn't being made. Not Speaking particularly to you here, but to any of us as we might do that. Arguments stand or fall on such things, or do in part.Truth : the real facts about something.
Obviously, if there are no facts, then something may not be true. Religions have very few if any facts, and even though they are spouted as the truth, there is no truth to them for lack of facts.I was speaking of each of our worldviews, the way in which we view or interpret our world. We each have a view of the world, or worldview. Some of them are better "reflectors" of the realities we observe, than others. Science lines up more with some, than others as well. The more your worldview lines up with actual truth, the better worldview you have. When it clashes with logic, science, and our human experience, its time to ask ourselves some big questions. Like many things in life, the best things aren't always the easiest or most preferred, but well worth it. Life is so precious and fast, why go for second best, or worse? We are beings that came from this world, and we ought to care what it is teaching us, at the very least.
Sorry, but the world does not clash with science, it aligns with it, that is the point of science, to help us understand how the world works. Therefore, we should each have the same reality and the same worldview, that is, unless you add to your worldview things that don't exist, but you have "faith" they do. That worldview does not align with reality.
You don't think intuition could be coming from your sub-conscious rather that an invisible undetectable, untestable source?
Come on, Doc, you can't honestly be saying that you think the word "mind" is used to describe the firing neurons and other physical happenings in the brain. The mind is the term used when speaking of the mental experience we all share. Consciousness, cognition, thought.
Brain - an organ of soft nervous tissue contained in the skull of vertebrates, functioning as the coordinating center of sensation and intellectual and nervous activity.
Mind - the element of a person that enables them to be aware of the world and their experiences, to think, and to feel; the faculty of consciousness and thought.
The brain is the blob in our skull and the mind is the result of the function of that blob. Those firing neurones cause consciousness and thought. That's why conscious thought can be seen in patterns from fMRI's."That's why conscious thought can be seen in patterns from fMRI's."
False.
"functional MRI (fMRI) is a functional neuroimaging procedure using MRI technology that measures brain activity by detecting associated changes in blood flow.[1] This technique relies on the fact that cerebral blood flow and neuronal activation are coupled. When an area of the brain is in use, blood flow to that region also increases." - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fmri
All an fMRI shows is what specific parts of the brain are active because that's where the oxygen is taken. That does not mean they can 'see' conscious thought. In that article you referred, when you said they "were reconstructing images of imaginary people that people held in their consciousness from fMRI's", that is also false. They showed subjects pictures of four people, told them a story associated with that person, and watched what regions of the brain were active during this process. Then, when they asked them to think about one of those subjects, they could tell by which regions were re-traced, which subject they were thinking about. This is significant because this appears to show that stored information is place in a specific place in the brain, then pulled from that same place when recalled. This does not, however, mean they were able to reconstruct images of imaginary people in their consciousness.
"Those firing neurones cause consciousness and thought."
That is not known. All that is known is that there is corresponding activity in specific regions of the brain that correlate with specific mental phenomena. It seems pretty certain these firing neurons play a significant role in the mental experience, but it is not known whether or not it is these themselves that 'cause' consciousness and thought.
Though, even if it was, if it were possible that pulses from neurons actually created consciousness, something that cannot be seen or detected, then that would bring up some much bigger questions. If just tiny pulses of electricity can actually create consciousness and thought, yet by all appearances just be neural cells firing small pulses of electricity, then it would seem matter/energy has capabilities and behaviors that are not currently observable. And that could mean there's a whole lot going on in this universe that we are completely blind to.http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Neuroscience
"At the cognitive level, cognitive neuroscience addresses the questions of how psychological functions are produced by neural circuitry. The emergence of powerful new measurement techniques such as neuroimaging (e.g., fMRI, PET, SPECT), electrophysiology, and human genetic analysis combined with sophisticated experimental techniques from cognitive psychology allows neuroscientists and psychologists to address abstract questions such as how human cognition and emotion are mapped to specific neural substrates."Yes, they "allow neuroscientists and psychologists to address abstract questions such as how human cognition and emotion are mapped to specific neural substrates". They do this by showing what parts of the brain are active. They do not, however, have the magical capability of showing conscious thought. They can't peer into the mind of an individual and actually see what they're thinking. They can only show what part of the brain is thinking.
Didn't you read the links about lie detectors and the ability to see who they were thinking about? What part of the brain is thinking? That is a clear connection between thought/mind and the brain. The science is there and it's testable, predictable, repeatable. At this point I'm not even sure what point you are trying to make.
The point I am trying to make is that the mind is not observable. And nothing in that link, nothing you've said, and nothing you've cut/pasted, has disagreed with that. The only thing we seem to disagree on is that you think it's a foregone conclusion that the activity we see in the brain IS the mind. You seem to think that being able to see physical brain activity means we can see the mind. Clearly that is not the case. We can only see where in the brain there is activity when the mind is active. But that does not mean we can SEE it.
I never said there isn't a connection between thought/mind and the brain.Are you saying we can't see the brain activity of an active mind? Because all those links seem to suggest otherwise.
I think your going to have to take that us with cognitive neuroscientist as they "address abstract questions such as how human cognition and emotion are mapped to specific neural substrates".
When they can tell what a person is thinking before the person tells them what they are thinking simply by looking at brain activity it can be said that thought can be observed wether you like it or not.I suggest you read that article again because you seem to have some pretty significant misconceptions about what it was saying. Remember, all fMRI can show is where the oxygenated blood is going. They show a subject a video of a person doing something. They tell them a story to go along with this person. While doing this they monitor the brain to see what areas 'light up' while they are absorbing and processing this information. Later, when they ask the subject to recall one of these individuals, they could then tell by which paths 'lit up' which one they were thinking about. Because they had the data from when they first learned this information, they could then see that the same paths were used to recall this same information. Again, all that means is that the oxygenated blood went to the same areas as before when they first learned of that particular individual. This does not mean they could 'observe' their thoughts. This means they could 'observe' the activity in the brain and see that the same areas were being accessed to recall. Each individual had a unique 'path' set when the information was learned. So they compared from before when they learned it to after when they recalled it. They could match the pattern using an algorithm.
Right, observable and predictable. Did you read the lie detector link? It's not 100% accurate because some people believe their own lies.
Sorry, this is rather futile.Yes I read the lie detector link and you're still wrong. That still has to do with areas of the brain bei ng used and not 'seeing' the mind. There's a difference between what parts of the brain are used when recalling memories and when imagination is being employed to make something up. If someone has convinced th emselves that the lie is real, then that lie is a memory and looks the same as when someone is telling the truth.
Not yet, but I wouldn't count that capability out in the future; No reason we shouldn't be able to eventually.
What faith? I'm merely expressing an opinion based on history. Where there is a will, there is a way,
As long as we agree mind reading isn't a present day reality, could you maybe help me help Dr Lamb understand that.
Well unless you can find a really good psychic... I'd have to agree with you. But I think doc would agree with both of us on that score, I don't think that's what he is really saying.
What I think he is saying is that there is nothing going on except physical processes and we can study those. The fact that we can't yet put actual images of your thoughts on a TV screen doesn't mean there is anything going on that is directly due to those processes as they interact with the outside world, so to speak. But I don't want to put words in his mouth. That's just what I read from his posts.
This consciousness discussion is interesting and so I'll tell you what I think. Short of a soul that is not energy or matter existing, it has to be as I described above.You've got it. I think there is enough evidence to suggest beyond question that consciousness is a result of a function of the brain. Can they see a movie of what the mind is seeing? No. Can they make predictions, is it testable, observable? Sure. Just so you know, lies are memories as well, we can remember lies, so Headly's lie detector theory is wrong.
You said ....
> "You see the mind is observable, detectable, measurable, predictable and testable."
> "What the link showed was that they were reconstructing images of imaginary people that people held in their consciousness from fMRI's"
> "Those firing neurones cause consciousness and thought. That's why conscious thought can be seen in patterns from fMRI's."
> "When they can tell what a person is thinking before the person tells them what they are thinking simply by looking at brain activity it can be said that thought can be observed...."
Yes, consciousness could very well be the result of brain function, but that does not mean observing brain function is 'observing' conscious thought, or 'observing' the mind.
Also, the lie detector thing, not a theory. Again, it's simply observing brain activity and not observing 'the mind'. The article said some neuroscientists claimed they could determine if someone is lying, but then it was decided this could not be used as it's not conclusive, then gave reasons. But basically those reasons were pointing out that simply observing brain function can be misleading. It doesn't necessarily tell you if someone is lying or not. It can be misinterpreted. In other ways, its in no way conclusive.Observing brain activity (Neurons firing) is indeed observing the brain working, however the results of that activity is the mind.
I think this ridiculous debate began when you asserted the mind is immaterial, a comparison you were using for your god or some other supernatural event. Fair enough.
If the mind is the immaterial result of a material brain that cannot be observed, as you assert, what is the material thing that would result in your supernatural example?I didn't use that comparison for my God, that's another assumption you're jumping to. I'm simply pointing out something that does indeed exist that is not detectable scientifically. If it does indeed turn out that the physical happenings of the material brain, physical firing neurons, can in fact create consciousness and reason and self-awareness, then it seems there are properties/behaviors of matter/energy that are completely invisible to us. Meaning, all matter/energy, as far as we know, could exhibit behaviors and capabilities that we cannot observe. The only reason we know it happens in the mind is because we each experience it.
The objection is often stated that if it's not observable, can't be measured, then it doesn't exist. Well, here's something that does.And just how is an IQ test not a measure of the minds ability?
It's a measure of the mind's ability based on the "output" of the individual. It still doesn't make the mind observable. The mind, in this case, must be 'revealed' through output. If you could actually 'observe' the mind, there'd be no need for a test.
Okay, now we are getting somewhere. The mind is testable, measurable, I think that is what Dr. Lamb has been saying, which is nothing like God. We know the mind exists because it's testable and measurable. Doctors can test for consciousness and IQ test measure the minds ability to perform certain tasks. You can continue stating that there are things that exist that are not testable or measurable if you like, but the mind is not an example as you have just admitted it's measurable and testable.
Now we can debate if the Higgs particle exist or not if you like, but I have no opinion on that one.Again, the only reason we know there's anything to test is because we experience it. If we didn't, we'd have no way to test it, no way of knowing how to test it, or that there's even anything to test.
From the outside a brain just looks like a glob of matter with firing neurons and oxygenated blood flow and chemical happenings. Nothing about looking at a brain would give you any indication about the mind. Only because we experience the mind do we know it's there. For all we know storm clouds could have a mind, nebulas could have a mind. We have no way or knowing and no way to test it, because they can't talk or fill out a test, so I guess we'll never know.Dog, cats or rats don't have minds like ours, but we can test them and observe their minds abilities. We know for instance that boarder collies and poodle are among the smartest dogs and beagles and grey hounds are dumb as wood. We can't experience their minds, but can still test for them and measure them.
Find something that we know is there that isn't testable, measurable or observable in some way.So do dogs have consciousness? Do earth worms have consciousness? Do you know why you can't answer either of those questions concretely?
Yes dogs are awake and aware of their surroundings. Earthworms respond to their surroundings as well.
And this leads you to the conclusion they have consciousness because?
Well... um... because being awake and aware of one's surroundings is kinda the definition of consciousness?
And we know this because...?
Come on, this is easy.Because one interacts with their surroundings when awake and aware of their surroundings. Much like wind is observable because of the interaction between it and other objects, thus the mind is also observable.
Not all that big of a conundrum.Yet you're still not seeing the simple truth of it. Everything we know about consciousness is because we experience consciousness. Because we are aware and awake, and because animals also appear to be awake and aware, we assume they must experience consciousness. Many of them, especially mammals, have brains very similar to ours. And when we can observe their brains, we see that their brains even act a lot like ours. So because we experience consciousness, we assume everyone else does too, so we assume they must experience the mind like we do. Because their brains do the same kinds of things as ours do, we assume that must be what creates that sensation that we experience, and that they must experience a mind too. Yet, in all of this, the mind has still never been observed. Only subjectively understood.
Um... no. Not scientifically.
The mind, once again, is completely observable because of the fact that it interacts with it's surroundings.
Everything else about your paragraph is even philosophically weak and is you attempting diversion.
Consciousness is merely awareness and wakefulness. That's it. Interaction proves consciousness. Consciousness proves mind.
We don't assume that every conscious being experiences consciousness in the same way. Differences don't imply consciousness does not exist. No assumptions necessary. Interaction=consciousness. Period. Brain scans prove interaction, yes, but any observable interaction is sufficient."Theory of mind is a theory insofar as the mind is not directly observable.[1] The presumption that others have a mind is termed a theory of mind because each human can only intuit the existence of his/her own mind through introspection, and no one has direct access to the mind of another. It is typically assumed that others have minds by analogy with one's own, and based on the reciprocal nature of social interaction, as observed in joint attention,[4] the functional use of language,[5] and understanding of others' emotions and actions. - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Theory_of_mind
Which is an absolutely wonderful theory that in no way addresses whether the mind or consciousness exists. It addresses empathy mainly, and stereotypical behavior, and the assumption that everyone experiences consciousness in the same way. What it does not address, however, is consciousness or the existence of the mind in general. It is not attempting to say that the mind is not observable, but that the inner workings of each individuals mind are not observable. It's not the same thing.
The fact that I am conscious and therefore the existence of my mind is obvious and observable. The reason I think Hugh Laurie is hot is not... (Which is still not precisely true, there are tons of scientific studies on hormone levels and the psychological reasons for attraction, but I digress)"It is not attempting to say that the mind is not observable, but that the inner workings of each individuals mind are not observable. It's not the same thing."
The first line literally says "the mind is not directly observable".Yes, which is obviously false. That's why wiki isn't a reliable source.
If it is obviously true to someone else, then they have offered the same as you have there. An opinion, or assertion.
Except that if I, personally, can observe it then it is obviously observable. For one who cannot observe it, I can see why they would think it opinion.
If you can personally observe that quote is obviously false, then another can personally observe that it is obviously true, and the same case can be made. Each is sharing their opinion of their agreement or disagreement with it. It is what backs each side that matters or "makes" these cases. This is what we have been observing here for days on end.
I can personally observe the mind, not your quote. As such, it is not opinion. Consciousness is not an abstract concept. It is measurable and testable. It is observable. It is provable.
This is not a philosophical question. There is a right and wrong. The problem is that the question is being used to form a philosophical point. The philosophical point is at odds with science and medicine... so instead of admitting it is a philosophical point, the science/medical knowledge is being denied.
It's a bit dishonest.It isn't my quote, it is wikipedia's quote (and not given by me, but HVN, I believe.). My guess, based on what you say there, is that you DEFINE the mind in a way that you can observe it. That is part of the reason some started posting definitions, as Dr. Lamb and ED were requesting. So each side went back and forth for days, each giving reasons and backing for their views.
No philosophical point needs to be assumed, nor drawn, to make the case that the mind cannot be observed materially. That might be an assumption. The case can be made without any philosophical view. What we saw being offered up as evidence, turned out to be observations of the brain, which no one was contesting is observable. The philosophical view I saw most employed was one of materialism, which is the whole point, that materialism can't weigh in on a mind. The stuff being spoken of, can't be "found" in the brain, or on an MRI, lie detector test, etc. Rational, reasonable arguments have been given for this. I didn't find it to be dishonest at all.
Because there is no separation between mind and brain.
It's not whether or not they're 'separated', its that there are some behaviors that can be seen, some that cannot. Those behaviors that can't be seen are the 'mind'.
Your actions tell that story. And so does brain activity and chemical levels. The trick is to map em and correlate them, and we doing that.
I love you. That was a completely conscious thought and expression.
I love you too hon. But since I love you for your body, consciousness is unnecessary and, indeed, is more of a hindrance
No Headly, we look up the definition of consciousness and see if it applies to others.
consciousness |ˈkänCHəsnəs|
noun
the state of being awake and aware of one's surroundingsThe only reason consciousness is in the dictionary to be looked up is because we experience it. Nobody has ever actually seen it. You just know you experience it, so you have to assume everyone else does too.
Look, you all obviously just have tunnel vision about this, for whatever reason. You're arguing just to argue, as far as I can tell. I hope you realize you're in the minority here, as philosophers and neurologists and everyone in between recognize this fundamental truth. It defines the human experience. Every link, every quote I've included, just continues to back up what I'm trying to get you to see. Every article you all have linked to, the same thing is true. "Mapping the brain" is all about associating physical observable functions with subjective unobservable mental states. That's what neuroscience is. It's not more than that. It's not magic.
Don't let them get you down. Psalms 37:23 The steps of a good man are ordered by the LORD: and he delighteth in his way.
No one is trying to get him down. We are having what is actually a pretty interesting conversation that I am suspicious is nearing it's end. Statements like "you have tunnel vision" generally mean "You are being irrational because you don't agree with me, so I'm taking my ball and going home."
For me, at least, this conversation has nothing to do with religion... except a vague suspicion that the existence of God is trying to be proved by proving that there are some things that exist but are not observable.... Which would be silly because even if that point was proved, it still wouldn't prove that God existed.
I appreciate your efforts here and am sure others do as well. You give great reasoning and backing for your views. Its not for lack of trying, that is for sure. You are in good company with those you mentioned, philosophers, neurologists, etc. The power of simply dismissing ideas is rather great, as we see. On a side note, what you have observed here does have an explanation at least, which supports some other ideas. I mean when nothing else can explain what we have seen here, and in the past. I hope in some way its an encouragement, an evidence of sorts all its own. It is to me anyway. Perhaps if not now, someone will think more on these things later, even though it seems to not be getting through now. That is about as positive as I can spin it.
Thank you for that. I appreciate your efforts as well. If human history has showed us anything, it's that we're slow to change what we think. So I don't expect tides to turn overnight, and I understand and try to be open to the things people might first need to get off their chest about this topic before they can really begin to come sit at the table and just have an honest talk. To me what's most important is to keep the conversation on track. To show that science is not the imminent domain of the non-believer, and that you don't have to let go of God to accept science or vise versa. I love the fact that I live in this scientific age and try to keep myself informed with all we're discovering, and I take issue with anyone who says my belief in God must mean I just don't REALLY get it. Nobody knows anything for sure. As long as we're honest and respectful with one another, I think most of us will find we're not all that different. There are those on both sides who like to reduce alternate viewpoints down to something simplistic and easy to dismiss, but the truth is both perspectives have legitimate reasoning to think and believe what they do.
I can never tell you what something is, I can only tell you how it behaves. I can call an electron anything I like as it doesn't have an intrinsic name. You can keep asking me "what is it really" for ever, and there is no answer to that other than it is what it does, how it behaves.
We lump all of something's traits and behaviors into a single word like electron, or consciousness. Most people don't even realize that when they say a word like that they are saying a concept or collection of things at the same time. Words like these are stories.
So we have a brain with all kinds of processes going on, we can think and feel. I'll take your word for it, because it is what I experience as well.
So if we know the behavior of the brain and are able to correlate what we feel and think to those processes, then we know we are on the right track. Were we not able to do that then we would be on the wrong track.
So far we are doing really well. New insights in neurology are happening every day. It's a very young field of study that has already been very successful.
Lets see what it finds. If it finds that those processes do not explain consciousness adequately then there are still other possibilities as to why that is than assuming a soul, which is ill defined at best.Well that is certainly a deeply philosophical way to look at it. I'm beating my head against the wall at the moment trying to get these others to simply admit what you said right here ... "So we have a brain with all kinds of processes going on, we can think and feel. I'll take your word for it, because it is what I experience as well." I am baffled by this conversation right now. If you haven't read all of it, I recommend it. It's a case study in denial.
I agree we're on the right track. I agree the mind is a product of the brain. I don't think all we are can be reduced to pure mechanics, but beyond that I'm open to the 'how'. Pure mechanics just doesn't make sense. I mean, it does in the fully determined since, but it doesn't in the "necessary illusion of free will" sense. That for our brains to function best, to be most beneficial, it must be under the illusion that it is making its decisions of its own volition. It's mechanical/biological matter, that's apparently in danger of getting too bummed out to work right. Instead it invents purpose and meaning in its life, again totally determined, and then goes about its day fooling itself into thinking it's in control to work right.
And through all of it, there's still the fact that there's obviously something there that our special mechanical glasses can't get a fix on. This bundle of matter and energy in our heads found the right mixture and configuration to create this mental experience that is completely invisible to the outside world. We probe at the brain with everything we've got and yet all we see is a hunk of biological matter.All of that sounded SOoo intellectual , cause it was! Right on. And that is as far as we will ever be able to understand, CAUSE ... we are the product of something. We can reverse engineer all of this only back so far. It is almost like we can be traced back to the die from which we were cast. But we don't know if that die was (per say) in a factory or some back yard some where. If it was a factory (?) what other products was being turned out?
We are not in a position to say!
Wherever this die was cast (?) ... some people call heaven. And the CEO of that factory (?) some people call GOD. What ever that is that is just out side of our physical eyes does interact with its product. Can I prove that I have had conversations with God ? No I can't, aint goina try. Heck ... I can't even prove to you people that I have had a conversation with my dad." but it doesn't in the "necessary illusion of free will" sense. That for our brains to function best, to be most beneficial, it must be under the illusion that it is making its decisions of its own volition."
Is that all you want to know? it is not an illusion. We do make choices of our own volition. Your genetic predisposition and conditioning are your will. they determine what you want. You are still willfully doing things even if your final choice is predetermined. It is predetermined by your conditioning which in essence is you, What else would you be?A passive observer, incapable of anything other than what I'm predisposed by conditioning to be, as in control of my actions as a waterfall is in choosing its path. Only under the illusion there is actually a choice.
You don’t get to be a passive observer. Life doesn’t allow for that. While you have a unique will and personality due to your conditioning, everyone else does too. You have needs and they have needs, some very different from yours.
Interaction doesn’t allow us to be passive observers and we must interact. We must form relationships like the atoms that create us. We do it for the same reasons, and when we do we create new things.
All the time we are reacting the way we think we should be so we act out of our own volition. We get rewards like feeling good, we learn. We re-condition ourselves in ways we hope will make us feel better about ourselves or make us what we consider better people.
You can never rid yourself of your conditioning because that’s what makes you who and what you are. But within the possible limits of who you are you can imagine yourself better and strive to become that person, and to do that you have to learn and by learning change your conditioning and your auto responses.
Energy constantly transforms and that’s what we do, we change and transform ourselves.
What else could we want? To be more than our conditioning? Like what? A separate soul or life essence trapped in a body? To what end? We don’t have fixed personalities or identities. They are dynamic.
People make the idea of a mechanical universe seem cold when it is obviously not. You love and love to love. You love life and many things about it. You wonder and again learn. You have eureka moments and moments of fantasy. You look up at the stars in amazement and at yourself in the same way.
So how cold is it? And what difference does it make if it is because you are a system or because you are a soul? None.
Since you are your conditioning, you are making choices of your own volition. Again, what more do you want? How would you as a soul make choices? By what mechanism? The nature of your soul? Same thing then. And we know about conditioning, but we don’t know anything about souls. We can’ even prove they exist even though almost everyone is sure they have one.
Of course they are. Their soul is their conditioning.
Free, in front of the word will is meaningless. Will is all you need, and yours is uniquely you. It is identical to “free” will, even though there is nothing free about it.
You have to work hard to be a passive observer. Eastern religions can train you how, if that’s what you want. But if you try it without having your life set up for it, cause and effect will slap you in the face. Even then you have to work to maintain the privilege.
The real job of enlightenment is making you feel good in your own skin, and in balance. Just like the atom at it’s lowest output of energy."Since you are your conditioning, you are making choices of your own volition."
It can't be both ways. Physical laws are physical laws. If it is purely mechanistic then there is no deviating willfully. Willfully deciding the actions and behaviors of this chunk of meat we animate means being able to deviate from pure cause. If you cannot actually deviate, then it is not truly a choice. If it is not a choice then love isn't love, but a determination. Who you 'choose' to spend your time with, not actually your choice. Who you choose to be, what you dream to be, human interactions, all fully deterministic. All of our actions were determined at the moment of the big bang. Now we're just matter bouncing about, colliding with one another, as the ripple plays out. All along under the illusion that we actually have some sort of control.
But if there is a soul, then there is a non-mechanistic element to the 'self'. An element not constricted to material law. And as I said before, maybe we think there's no 'soul' because we have a preconceived idea of what a 'soul' is. A seemingly antiquated, primitive concept tied to an age-old title. Yet a soul is described as something spiritual, non-material. The mental experience that decides our actions/inactions and behaviors, is a non-material construct. If all living things are conscious to some extent, with consciousness only able to act out in the physical world in as much as its physical form is capable, then all living things have something 'soul'-like. If that soul were in a body/brain with a sophisticated neocortex that makes that soul capable of reason and an acute self-awareness, then it is possible that this in itself would grant this soul the capability of a "free" will. A will no longer behaving deterministically based on pure mechanics and instinct, but a reasoning being making decisions from a truly individual/"free" perspective.I have outlined a mechanism for will which we can observe as being true. That is to say you do have predispositions given by your genes. Your environment, upbringing and experience play off that predisposition creating a unique individual that makes choices based on how it wants to respond.
Everything has to have a mechanism or structure.
Even if a god "grants" you will, how is that freer? Something has granted it. You still have a personal history and all these predispositions. You can't go against nature.
So what is the mechanism for a soul and how can it give you "free" will? And what is a spirit?
All these things you describe: soul, spirit and "free" are not observable facts. I put it to you that they are the brain imagining it is something it is not, and nothing more.."You can't go against nature. "
People do all the time. When you rush into a burning building to save a complete stranger (going against the natural survival instinct). Every time you make a decision to do something that goes against your natural instincts and emotions. Every time you choose not to have sex despite extremely strong sexual instinct or desire. Every time you CONTROL a desire or emotion or instinct, you are using your free will and going against nature.Just to be clear, there is no such thing as a selfless act.
http://slartyobrian.hubpages.com/hub/No … lfless-ActI wasn't talking about selfless act.
I was talking about controlling yourself over your natural instincts. I wasn't suggesting it was a selfless act to not be a rapist because you controlled your urge.But it's natural for humans and other animals to control their urges. It's just how our minds have developed. It's the ego's job to keep those urges at bay. We train our dogs to not touch us with their teeth even though it's natural for them to do so. We train our men to not rape and pillage, it's possible because it's natural for us to do so.
Sure. That's why when push comes to shove, there are very few people who won't stomp on your face to get to the last bag of rice.
It's a matter of following your instincts, or deciding not to.Instinct is dynamic. You change your auto response by educating the subconscious through conscious deliberation and other means, Hence you educate and thereby change your instinct. That is not going against your nature, that is your nature.
You're exactly right, none of it is observable. If something exists that is not material, then it isn't observable scientifically being that science only deals in the material. So, if something non-material were to be the cause behind the behavior of something material, to science the cause would simply be unknown. Something the materialist assumes we just don't understand 'yet'. So, if you were to hypothesize something non-material/non-observable as a cause, kind of like gravity, you can only see and understand the unobservable by looking at the behavior of the hypothesized observable result.
That's why the things I'm speaking of are significant in my view. The mind, consciousness. These are by all appearances non-existent. Except to the self. Externally, no one can see your thoughts or your conscious mind as you see it. Including scientifically. So here we have something that exists that cannot be observed in any material sense that has obvious ties to the behavior of something physical and observable, the body. This is why I point to the things that are so often dismissed as material mechanics, but that in no way actually resemble anything mechanical. Like will and passion and determination and the "human spirit". Things that are not explained mechanistically in any real observable sense, but rather by mere assumption.
Like I pointed out before, If all that we are, body/brain and mind, is nothing more than material, then everything you describe, the mechanism for a will, predetermined behaviors and characteristics, how we interact and react to our environment, can only be determined mechanistically as well. While the "will" is most certainly present, and can in itself be explained mechanistically (though not in any concrete objective way), it cannot "freely" make choices. Material cause can only be that. Willfully making a real choice would be the equivalent of a rock "choosing" its path as it rolls down a hill. Which means, all we experience in the mind, where it seems as though we're weighing options and drawing on the memories of past life experience, and imagining potential outcomes, while all of that is indeed going on in our minds, all we're really doing is passively observing a process that only gives the illusion that we're actively controlling it. When in actuality, there is no deviation from pure material cause, so there can be no real "choice". Which means everything we hold most dear about being human, love, desire, passion, the "human spirit" and our resolve to overcome, our biggest achievements as well as our ugliest acts of atrocity, all of it was actually determined in the moment the universe inflated into existence. We either have a truly free will, separate from the bounds of physical deterministic law, or we are nothing more than passive observers under the illusion that we are in control of our actions, when in actuality the laws of nature are in control of our actions.
In either case, where the potential for non-material things are concerned, there would be no observable cause to give us an objective answer to confirm which viewpoint is right. So, based on the 'not understood yet' behaviors of the mind that most everyone assumes will eventually prove to be mechanistic, even though they in no way resemble mechanistic behaviors, I conclude that the more likely explanation is that there is indeed other elements at work that are not material, yet have a very real impact on the material body. Not a claim I'm saying I can prove, mind you, just the rational that leads me to the conclusion I've reached.Forgive me, but from where I sit it appears what you have done when given two possible explanations is simply jumped from the proven history of science finding the answers to wishful thinking. Historically has science not provided answers where some said it never would? God done it? How are you not jumping to God done it?
This one post is not the entirety of the logical progression that leads to God. This is just a step. But you've heard many of those other steps as well. So you should know better than just about anyone that there's no 'jump' here.
No, our mental experiences are indeed of a material construct, the brain and the mind. The soul/spirit/whatever has not been shown to have any such construct. It is basically just "antiquated, primitive concept tied to an age-old title"
No, they have something "brain-like""our mental experiences are indeed of a material construct"
If that were true thoughts would be observable. And by 'thoughts' I don't mean the physical happenings in the brain that 'cause' the thought, but the actual thought as you experience it. If you picture a red truck in your head, that it is not a material truck. That is an image formed by one or more neurons being fed oxygen and generating pulses of electricity. The mental experience as you and I experience it is clearly abstract.You just said "an image formed by one or more neurons being fed oxygen and generating pulses of electricity" which is obviously material.
Yes, neurons and pulses of electricity are obviously material, yet you see a truck. Where's the truck? You being able to see a truck as the result of that material event in your brain means that at the very least there are behaviors that the matter of your brain are capable of that cannot be seen in any material sense. So, that truck and everything else that makes up your mental experience IS non-material, yet definitely exists.
The very same 'mind' that came up with the argument "Non-material = non-existent" disproves its own argument.Sorry, but mental images are stored in the "material" brain with "material" mechanisms.
http://www.neurosciences.us/courses/sys … slyn05.pdfI didn't say they weren't. Doesn't make them observable.
Even though that peer reviewed article says they are.
No it didn't. At no point was the actual mind observed. Only a simulation based on brain activity.
*sigh* What a waste of time trying to explain things to you, yet again.
