OT: Frank and Dave's Philosophical Kebab Emporium

At the risk of boring people to death over this, I'd imagine he was saying that God has little presence in the workings and motivations of modern man. He wasn't saying the transcendent God didn't exist, because God's existence is not dependent on belief (sorry Monty, and Douglas Adams).
This is very much a Western European viewpoint anyway, because in many other parts of the world God has a significant presence in day to day life.
I can vouch for this having recently been in Turkey and being woken up at 6 am every day by the Muslim call to prayer.

 

Sorry saint, I was being sarcastic. I know what he is trying to say. But I do contest that this is a Western European viewpoint. Put that way it is implicit that the view described is subscribed to by at least a majority of Western Europeans which is not proven to be the case. The furthest that I would go would be that this is an individual idea developed in Western Europe - subtle difference.

 

I think the first part is stating that man has killed the ideal of God and all he stands for, the 2nd part is about how we have replaced God with ourselves.

 

"Now it is such a bizarrely improbable coincidence that anything so mindbogglingly useful could have evolved purely by chance that some thinkers have chosen to see it as the final and clinching proof of the non-existence of God.
"The argument goes something like this: 'I refuse to prove that I exist,' says God, 'for proof denies faith, and without faith I am nothing.'
"'But,' says Man, 'the Babel fish is a dead giveaway, isn't it? It could not have evolved by chance. It proves you exist, and so therefore, by your own arguments, you don't. QED.'
"'Oh dear,' says God, 'I hadn't thought of that,' and promptly vanishes in a puff of logic.
"'Oh, that was easy,' says Man, and for an encore goes on to prove that black is white and gets himself killed on the next zebra crossing.
"Most leading theologians claim that this argument is a load of dingo's kidneys, but that didn't stop Oolon Colluphid making a small fortune when he used it as the central theme of his bestselling book, Well That about Wraps It Up for God."


Er, quite.

 

Trying to say something DD or just filling space?

 

They're only crutches and umbrellas if I use them in day to day life Liv. That's the significant difference between wants and needs.

So to answer your questions, as I thought I stated quite clearly: so far, I have rejected the case presented by all religions known to me as evidence proving a God exists because I deem them contradictory or insufficient (for me). I've had no direct visitation from said God either so I can't state categorically that God exists. That doesn't remove the existence of the question though does it? If I took that approach I'd be unscientific: can't find proof so the question doesn't exist anymore...smacks of can't be arsed.

But....from a scientific point of view if I start with the statement "God does not exist, prove it." Science has yet given what it would consider itself as definitive proof there is no God, so again, I can't stand up and declare it.

As to your second question I've answerd that too. The fluffy list as you put it are the reasons I think there "should" be a God and obviously following on from that I'd rather he wasn't the southern babtist type currently dropping my dead granny in a cauldron of fiery hell because she forgot to pray one day of her mortal existence. But that's selfish wants and weaknesses and I recognize them as such and so have little bearing on the argument here or in my head. My wants on the matter are irrelevant.

You call it a crutch, how so? I'd have thought if I actually let my neutral fence sitting position on this singular issue directly effect my life it would be the opposite of a crutch/umbrella. I don't follow any current religious processes so run the risk of failing afterlife requirements (or at least the good eternity) and I haven't made the resolution that this life is it and fallen into the depths of despair at the futility and insignificance of my life. See! Your questions are cloaked in your own perception. You probably come from the position that this life is it so make the most of it. Can't say that's wrong. But you also can't say it's wrong that a person who decides this is it, doesn't like "it" and despairs. Neither attitude removes the reality of whether this life is it or not merely it's a consequence to that person on reaching that conclusion. I'm not hiding from the conclusion as you seem to be inferring, I'm simply saying there's yet to be a conclusion I can draw..and so I make life decisions based on other information day to day.

I live my life with the constant internal battle between "good" and "evil" as I personally define those terms. Each of us has the capacity for both and hence whether God exists or not it's about personal responsibility in how I move around and interact with this world. I will despite all efforts have unfulfilled wants and desires by the end but I hope I allowed non of those weaknesses or failures to so dominate my life that I did little else. As a fence sitter I think that is a positive attitude to take to a finale grave or in front of a creator judging or not.

Now. What I always wondered is why these next or even alternate plains of existence needed a landlord. Does sciences occasional dabble in Multiverse or Many Worlds theory (some dispute it as science at all) show an attempt to name God under a scientific guise?

Is it the same wishful thinking Liv refers to at least in the case of the many worlds theory....I made a wrong choice but the other me made the right one? Is MWI an agnostics dream lol.....

 

"Energy can not be created or destroyed. It can only change from one form to another"

 

so what happens to batteries then if energy can't be destroyed?

the casing that the energy was stored in can be recycled, but as there is no more energy left in the cells, what happens to it and what form does it then take on?

 

I'm not a scientist so how does that statement which I've heard before sit with the big freeze or heat death theories to the end of the universe.

Or does it not lol.....

 

My laymans version is that you're forgetting the energy in the battery didn't just disappear..it was converted into motion or light etc e.g batteries in a toy car to get it moving(energy changed from one form to another) ...to friction with surface which stops it but the friction transfers the energy to heat and so on..

I think....

 

make sense frank, cheers.

feel a little ******ed now lol, see why i stayed clear of science as i was crap at it, even if it interested me.

 

I think my version is incredibly clumsy J..RHC or CCC will be along to give you the proper one lol.

I was always interested but mathematics plays too big a part in it all for me to have been any good at it past school.

Although if the world?universe applications had been described more vividly it may have captured my imagination more.

I may be wrong, maybe those two will tell you but it always seems like it's a language to learn. When I look at equations I see symbols on a page that I had to figure out to get more symbols. I always imagine these guys read this stuff and see stars......

 

Let me answer that with another question. Where has the energy from the battery gone?

 

You need to understand the concept of entropy. Neither of those 'possible' theories compromises this fundamental law of thermodynamics.

 

Well in Frank

 

thought about that and have another question.

can accept that the energy gets turned into light, but what does that get turned into once the energy supplying the light runs out as obviously the light goes.

what becomes of the non light lol

just looks like its a cycle waiting to start all other again to me.

 

'Energy cannot be created or destroyed' - my take on that: The universe could not have created itself using natural processes because nature did not exist before the universe came into existence. Something beyond nature must have created all the energy and matter that is observed today. Present measures of energy are immeasurably enormous, indicating a power source so great that "infinite" is the best word we have to describe it. The logical conclusion [?] is that a supernatural Creator with infinite power created the universe. There is no energy source capable to originate what we observe today.

Another interesting question - was mathematics discovered or invented?

Sorry btw Frank I never got back to you directly on the other thread or this one but I think I've made my position clear enough, if not ask me

 

So one answer is that the light created is absorbed by a plant(s), thus driving photosynthesis, thus driving growth so that the plant can be eaten by a cow which we then eat and then burn the chemicals creating other forms of energy - kinetic (playing footy), heat (keeping us warm), ad infinitum.

Easier if you google the 'laws of thermodynamics

 

Mate. These threads have become interposed. These questions and discussions should be on the science thread.

 

Isn't that what we're on?