Piper
Orbiting Space Addict
pm'ed
Do you believe.
- Thread starter ryan
- Start date
pm'ed
Star explorer
New member
- Joined
- May 15, 2008
- Messages
- 377
- Reaction score
- 3
- Points
- 0
so what your sayin to piper is that why not belive in god just in case he is real (wich i would like to add i believe he is)
ryan
That guy
- Joined
- Feb 23, 2008
- Messages
- 1,603
- Reaction score
- 4
- Points
- 0
- Location
- Brisbane, Queensland, Australia
Im not saying that at all, i could believe the earth is flat, it could or couldnt be. I dont think the earth it flat though.
Piper
Orbiting Space Addict
I know, but someone who believes in something thinks that there is something. As for other life in the universe, I neither think there is nor think there isn't. I just don't think there is enough evidence either way for me to draw a belief. Yes, there is evidence that life should and can be out there, but without solid evidence of other life, I can't draw a conclusion (or a belief).
As for cats, yes, cats are VERY lazy. Except for kittens named "Cookie", they bounce around from one side of the house to the other and drive you nuts.
ryan
That guy
- Joined
- Feb 23, 2008
- Messages
- 1,603
- Reaction score
- 4
- Points
- 0
- Location
- Brisbane, Queensland, Australia
A belief doesnt need evidence.
Star explorer
New member
- Joined
- May 15, 2008
- Messages
- 377
- Reaction score
- 3
- Points
- 0
besides even though god is a believe wich as you said dosent need evidence there is plenty of evidence that he exists.
eveningsky339
Resident Orbiter Slave
Any evidence that is proposed to support the notion of God is largely ignored or down-played by people who don't believe in a God.
It's like trying to show a fundamentalist Christian evidence for an old earth. They act as though you are some ignorant fool led astray by the devil and don't even glance at your evidence.
Piper
Orbiting Space Addict
That's hardly true. Not only did I use to be very religious, I put a lot of study into the idea of God. I even went as far as to learn Koine Greek (the language of the New Testament) so as to know it better (albeit my Koine is terribly rusty). I've heard all the arguments, and weighed them very carefully. In the end I was forced to concede there was no good evidence for a god, and that in all likely-hood there isn't one.
eveningsky339
Resident Orbiter Slave
The theory of intelligent design puts forth some compelling evidence, such as the anthropic principal. It all depends on how you interpret it.
Besides, God is by definition a supernatural being, and while there may be evidence for Him in his creation, science cannot study the supernatural. It's "above nature".
Piper
Orbiting Space Addict
Intelligent design is utter nonsense, and the anthropic principal does not support God (indeed, it is used to disprove intelligent design). All the anthropic principle states is that any universe that we exist in, has to by definition support intelligent life. That's it.
We can't disprove God because he's supernatural, so he exists? We can't disprove leprechauns, Thor, Quetzalcoatl or the tooth fairy, does that mean they exist? Of course not, and same for God. Besides, if God exists, and he does things like answer prayers, perform miracles, etc, then he will produce effects in our natural world. Even if we can't measure he's supernatural properties, we should be able to measure what he does on the world, for example, prayer. There's been tons of studies on prayer, and they virtually all show the same thing, prayer doesn't work. Take for an example this study: http://www.beliefnet.com/story/188/story_18848_1.html . In the study it should that people who were prayed for (and didn't know about it) and those who weren't did equally good. However, those who were prayed for and did know it, did worse.
Now of course, a person who is a deist and just believes that a god created the universe, and didn't touch it afterwards, then yes, their would be no way to prove or disprove it, but if you believe in a God that we can communicate with, and who can effect our lives (ie, the God of the bible, quran, and most religions), then we can study its effects.
bujin
New member
Non-primitive does not necessarily imply intelligent. I suppose it depends on what you mean by the term. I take primitive life to mean single-celled organisms, microbes, bacteria, viruses, etc... and non-primitive life to mean creatures composed of many different types of cell that each have a distinct function, working together for the benefit of the body as a whole, so that could mean humans, reptiles, snails, houseflies, etc...
I have to add that I agree with Piper on intelligent design too.
jedidia
shoemaker without legs
Well, on that argument I have to say that it stands mostly on PoV.
Eveningsky talked about "Evidence" of God. The Problem is, this "evidence" can allways be explained in natural ways. Let's take a few archeologic findings as an example: The Ruins of a city still covered in remenants of Sulphur has been found in the location where according to the bible Sodom and Gomorra have stood. Now there are natural ways to explain sulfur-covered ruins. No big deal really. Also, parts of chariots have been found on the floor of the red sea. There's also natural explanation for this. There's alot more, and allways there are natural explanations for the phenomenon. Which doesn't really PROOF that the causes were natural.
It really depends on what is more likely. Which depends on your point of view. If you believe in God, nothing is more likely than that this is the proof that what is written in the bible really happened. If you don't believe, nothing is more likely than that these were natural occurences, turned into mythology by the superstitious people of the time.
So there is proof THAT some things happened, however not for HOW they happened. BUT: It has been the very beginning and the essence of science to search for NATURAL CAUSES. Why does it rain? because God makes it rain, people said at some time, which in its metaphysical dimension hasn't lost any of its truth for me. But thanks to science we now know what causes the rain, making us able to actually foretell weather (with a more or less accuracy, agreed...
), something that would have been considered prophecy in ancient times.So expecting from scientists to accept the cause "God" for ANY effect really isn't what we should. They are paid to find out natural causes to use these causes for uesefull aplications, and they are not doing a bad job. However, with discovering natural causes behind things, there isn't much left we can assign to God without sounding a bit stupid, and maybe that's what bothers most people.
anyways, here we go again!! :rofl:
ryan
That guy
- Joined
- Feb 23, 2008
- Messages
- 1,603
- Reaction score
- 4
- Points
- 0
- Location
- Brisbane, Queensland, Australia
My biggest experience with god is when, i was watching a show about the columbia accident and they were looking for the tape that recored data from re-entry, it fell from 12km, faster than a bullet, it was fine, thats just weird, a blessing, it seemed like someone just cushioned that great information.
jedidia
shoemaker without legs
Well, the problem you run nto with such statements is "why didn't god save the people instead of the tape?" 
Star explorer
New member
- Joined
- May 15, 2008
- Messages
- 377
- Reaction score
- 3
- Points
- 0
Well, the problem you run nto with such statements is "why didn't god save the people instead of the tape?"
god cant save evrybody from death cause if he did the world would go mad people would shoot at eachother knowing that god would save them all order would be lost.
also if god isent real how did the universe even start how did anything start.
bujin
New member
This is called the "argument from ignorance". In other words, "I don't know, so therefore God must have done it".
Doesn't hold any water, unfortunately.
I suppose it could also be the "argument from first cause", which is also flawed on the basis of the following logic:
If everything needs a first cause, then God also needs a first cause. So what caused God? What? You say that God doesn't need a cause? Then that blows apart your argument that everything needs a cause. If that's the case, how do you know that the universe needs a cause?
ar81
Active member
- Joined
- Jun 19, 2008
- Messages
- 2,357
- Reaction score
- 8
- Points
- 38
- Location
- Costa Rica
- Website
- www.orbithangar.com
Ok, I believe in me as a creator of V'jer...
eveningsky339
Resident Orbiter Slave
In the minds of atheists, the anthropic principal basically means, "If the universe wasn't like this, we wouldn't be here to study it."
In the minds of theists, the anthropic principal means, "God fine-tuned the universe for our existence."
Both sides of this debate are simply viewing this principal in completely different ways.
Hold on there bronco, I never said we couldn't prove or disprove God. I meant that we can't use science to prove or disprove God. Believe it or not, there is more to life than science, although most everything else has taken a back seat to science in recent times.
We cannot prove or disprove God, IMO, to large numbers of people. It's a personal thing. I know God exists through His answers to my prayers and other things that I'm not going to get into.
Yes.
When one of my sunday school teachers was about 10, his mom was diagnosed with breast cancer. The doctors took her to surgery to harvest lymph nodes and see how far the cancer had spread. Before she went in, my teacher held her hand and cried and prayed that God would take the cancer out of her body. The surgeons didn't have to harvest any lymph nodes that day, because they couldn't find any cancer.
Studies can be so manipulated that I don't trust any of them anymore, even if they are in support of my beliefs.
Most people don't realize that God doesn't answer prayer if it is not according to His will. If it is not God's will for a tricycle to appear in front of me, I can pray for a tricycle all day long, but it's not going to happen.
I agree completely.
eveningsky339
Resident Orbiter Slave
"I don't know, so therefore abiogenesis must have done it." Sounds awfully familiar...
martins
Orbiter Founder
It seems to me that splitting life into "primitive" and "non-primitive" or "intelligent" and "non-intelligent" groups is a rather anthropocentric view. Just because we consider ourselves the crown of evolution or creation (as you like), doesn't mean that oversized brains are necessarily a good idea when it comes to survival, and that life would naturally tend towards developing "intelligence". Simplicity and large numbers may turn out to be a far better strategy in that respect. Viruses and microorganisms will probably roam the earth long after humans are a distant history. Plus, their simplicity and robustness makes them far better interstellar travelers than we can ever hope to be. Viruses may be busy colonising the galaxy as we speak, while we are stuck on this planet, trying to keep our brains occupied with musings about god, the universe and everything ...
