|
Register | Sign In |
|
QuickSearch
EvC Forum active members: 66 (9164 total) |
| |
ChatGPT | |
Total: 916,483 Year: 3,740/9,624 Month: 611/974 Week: 224/276 Day: 64/34 Hour: 1/2 |
Thread ▼ Details |
|
Thread Info
|
|
|
Author | Topic: God.....again. | |||||||||||||||||||||||
Peter Member (Idle past 1501 days) Posts: 2161 From: Cambridgeshire, UK. Joined: |
Interestingly I read in a recent New Scientist article that
some of the supposed universal constants are changing ...
|
|||||||||||||||||||||||
Peter Member (Idle past 1501 days) Posts: 2161 From: Cambridgeshire, UK. Joined: |
As an atheist I only tend to talk about god if I encounter
some-one who believes and has an axe to grind. [Added by edit for no particular reason:-I remember a day when I encountered a Mormon missionary in a town centre, and stood talking to him for about an hour and half ... until the point where he said to me 'Well, I've got to be going now, nice speaking to you.' and backed away in a great hurry. I thought it was funny ... local Jehovah's tend to avoid my house now too [This message has been edited by Peter, 07-21-2003]
|
|||||||||||||||||||||||
Weyland Inactive Member |
I had a similar incident with the LDS.
We were (very politely) approched by and exceedingly clean cut Mormon who asked us if he could talk to us about his religion. I suggested that he was wasting his time, as I'm an atheist and my better half is a Catholic. He spend 10 seconds talking to her, determined that she was an active practising Catholic, and proceeded to ignore her for the next 30 minutes while he dug himself into a hole with Old Testament Inerrancy. I think that was the first time I'd discussed religion with anyone in about a year - it doesn't come up as a day to day conversation.
|
|||||||||||||||||||||||
Miguel Inactive Member |
Crashfrog:
Basically you say that i'm reasoning backwords. I predicted your answer . And again i say, that this is not really an explanation... But i never said that the fact that the universe is fine-tuned is an absolute proof that God did it... But it makes me wonder... [This message has been edited by Miguel, 07-21-2003] [This message has been edited by Miguel, 07-21-2003] [This message has been edited by Miguel, 07-21-2003]
|
|||||||||||||||||||||||
sr Inactive Member |
______________________
But i never said that the fact that the universe is fine-tuned is an absolute proof that God did it... But it makes me wonder...______________________ The classical understanding of what is god within most of the Eastern philosophies that god is the Absolute, the Ultimate Reality that harmonizes all dualities. If creation is an absolute proof of that the Absolute dit it, that Absolute should also make the non-creation,as the Ultimate Reality is taken as non-dual. What is the proof of non-creation?
|
|||||||||||||||||||||||
sr Inactive Member |
The idea given by the most prominent Eastern Philosophy (Vedanta) is that the Absolute should be a non-dual substance that harmonizes all dualities and that it is not afected by any of them.
Creation is only noticed by one's conscience, and so, there are different levels of creation acccording to the state of conscience. As the Asolute is the Absolute conscience and the collective conscience, all the individual beings that are also part and parcels of that Absolute, should notice and experience these different levels ofcreation. That philosophic school classifies 5 stages of consciousness, as follows: 1. jagrata or awaken state. 2. sandhya or dreaming state 3. suspti or deep sleep, with no dreams. 4. mugdha or swoomin state. 5. samadhi or supra-consciousnes state. The idea given by them is that the non-dual substance termed as Brahman should harmonize creation and the different aspects of it with non-creation. Thus, susupti is taken as the state of non-creation that harmonizes creation. And it can also be experimented by everyone, as well as creations.
|
|||||||||||||||||||||||
nator Member (Idle past 2192 days) Posts: 12961 From: Ann Arbor Joined: |
quote: Gosh, frog, you sound like one of us Agnostics!
|
|||||||||||||||||||||||
nator Member (Idle past 2192 days) Posts: 12961 From: Ann Arbor Joined: |
quote: Well, wouldn't this 'evidence' be apparent to everyone if it existed? What evidence are you talking about, anyway? Oh, and why do you make that strange connection between not believing and god and acceptance of the evidence of evolution? God could exist AND evolution be true, you know. It may be that your idea of god and what god can and does do is incorrect.
|
|||||||||||||||||||||||
nator Member (Idle past 2192 days) Posts: 12961 From: Ann Arbor Joined: |
quote: ...except that we have directly observed one species turning into another rather frequently. Here's an exaple, with many more found at the link: http://www.talkorigins.org/faqs/speciation.html
quote: quote: Sorry, the evidence for god is entirely subjective and individual-dependent. By contrast, anyone can look at the data in support of any scientific theory, such as the ToE.
quote: What indirect evidence of god do you have? I mean, what specific predictions about the nature of the universe have been made wrt determining the existence of god which have been borne out?
|
|||||||||||||||||||||||
Dan Carroll Inactive Member |
quote: Why are you assuming that this is the case? Wouldn't it be more likely that life simply had to adjust itself to suit the pre-existing laws of the universe? As for your first question... I'm an athiest, and I talk about God a lot. 99% of the time, it's a believer that brings the topic up, and insists on a conversation about it. (Whether directly, by attempting to convert me, or indirectly, by defending a law based on religious belief.) That's just my experience, though. Your mileage may vary. [This message has been edited by Dan Carroll, 07-21-2003]
|
|||||||||||||||||||||||
Peter Member (Idle past 1501 days) Posts: 2161 From: Cambridgeshire, UK. Joined: |
I think there's a difference between acknowledging that
you might be wrong, and not being sure one way or the other. 'As far as I can tell that's a red ball' being different to 'I'm not sure if that is a red ball or a blue dodecahedron.'
|
|||||||||||||||||||||||
nator Member (Idle past 2192 days) Posts: 12961 From: Ann Arbor Joined: |
quote: I understand the difference, but I don't know that your example is analogous to my thoughts and crashfrog's thoughts about the existence of God. I mean, we are both agreeing that there is no evidence for God, and he concludes that there must not be any God, yet will accept that there may be one and evidence might come forth which would cause him to accept the existence of god. I can't see how this is substantively different from my position, which is that there is no evidence for god, but we don't know, nor can we perceive, everything. We just don't know. I don't know if this makes Crashfrog an Agnostic or me an Atheist, thoug.
|
|||||||||||||||||||||||
crashfrog Member (Idle past 1489 days) Posts: 19762 From: Silver Spring, MD Joined: |
Gosh, frog, you sound like one of us Agnostics! As I think I've argued before, if I sound like an agnostic, it's because there's no meaningful difference between being an agnostic and being atheist within the scientific framkework of tenativity of knowledge. I'm basically as sure as I can be that there's no god. I think that makes me atheist even though that's not the same as absolutely sure.
|
|||||||||||||||||||||||
nator Member (Idle past 2192 days) Posts: 12961 From: Ann Arbor Joined: |
Well, I have always thought of Athiests holding that there was no god as if they do know for sure, but I could easily be mistaken.
That's a big reason I call myself an Agnostic; I don't know. What's more, I don't think anybody knows. I guess the difference is that I have always thought that Athiests wouldn't accept evidence for God if it came about, but Agnoostics would, but maybe this just shows my ignorance of Atheism.
|
|||||||||||||||||||||||
Peter Member (Idle past 1501 days) Posts: 2161 From: Cambridgeshire, UK. Joined: |
I see what you mean.
To me atheism is a position statement, as is agnosticism, ortheism. I would class you as agnostic, in the sense that you do notcome down one way or another, while crashfrog (like myself) is an atheist -- there is no God as far as I am concerned but hey if you can show me I'm wrong that's fine. Admitting that you might be wrong is not the same as not having made the belief-choice (and atheism etc. are just beleifs after-all ... it's just that mpost atheists have their reasons for beleiving that way ... more so than 'I was brought up in [insert religion of choice].' Theists tend to be of the 'There IS a god, show me I'm wrongand I'll redefine everything so that there is still a God.'
|
|
|
Do Nothing Button
Copyright 2001-2023 by EvC Forum, All Rights Reserved
Version 4.2
Innovative software from Qwixotic © 2024