Vagueness and the Aftermath - A sporadic diary

[EvilPie]

Clearly God didn't really rest on Sunday. It was just his hobby day and he decided to create the internet.

[mulhuzz]

man, if we're gonna discuss this properly, I'll need a real scientist to verify what I'm about to say....

much of the universe exists in the way it does because it is the only way it could have existed.

that's what I take from what I've been reading lately (Penrose and Cox/Forshaw, amongst others).

The question then is why the rules of the game (the fundamentally universal and in some cases axiomatic laws of physics and the 'language' of maths) are the way they are.

[EvilPie]

Serious question regarding Gods and all that.

Obviously we all know that there are many religions with many different Gods.

Do all/most of these religions claim that their God was the "creator" in the same way Christians do or are some of them just rulers?

[kinboshi]

Ok, humour me for a moment...

I lay no claims for any specific deity, nor have I spent time reading Hawking, Dawkins or Cox in depth so bear with me...

As I understand it the argument from the Dawkinistas is that, because the whole thing is so vast, so amazingly complex and so staggeringly difficult to understand, it must have all happened by chance.?

A collision of neutrons or Higgs-Boson bits or whatever; a spot of evolution and here we all are debating how it happened from locations around the world in pretty much real time.

The means by which we now debate this, the worldwideweb, is vast, amazingly complex, and difficult to understand.
and developed, as does much technology through a series of evolutionary changes (survival of the fittest saw off 8track and betamax and both of the surviviors of those battles were in turn rendered extinct by further progress) .

Did the internet just happen 'by chance' through some form of Big Bang?



ninja edit - I'm not looking for a fight, just some interesting and thought provoking debate

The basic argument is where is god?  Where was he meant to intervene, and if he is still intervening (monitoring everyone's thoughts, actions, causing plagues and disasters, answering prayers, helping sportsmen win matches and helping people find a parking space at the supermarket when it's raining, etc.) how is he intervening and why did he find it necessary to set up this vast universe and the laws of physics for him to then act outside them?  Why would he bother himself with every individual thought of every one of a species of relatively intelligent primates (well, those who happened to be born in the past 6,000 years, not sure why he wasn't interested in the ones born before then) located on one specific planet orbiting one of the 100 sextillion stars in the universe.

The scientist asks for evidence.  There isn't any.  The believer has his faith, doesn't need evidence. 

Also, if the universe is so complex that it requires a divine super-powered being to create it, then where did this complex divine being come from, because if something that's complex has to be designed and created, then who created god...?

[Rod Paradise]

Ok, humour me for a moment...

I lay no claims for any specific deity, nor have I spent time reading Hawking, Dawkins or Cox in depth so bear with me...

As I understand it the argument from the Dawkinistas is that, because the whole thing is so vast, so amazingly complex and so staggeringly difficult to understand, it must have all happened by chance.?

A collision of neutrons or Higgs-Boson bits or whatever; a spot of evolution and here we all are debating how it happened from locations around the world in pretty much real time.

The means by which we now debate this, the worldwideweb, is vast, amazingly complex, and difficult to understand.
and developed, as does much technology through a series of evolutionary changes (survival of the fittest saw off 8track and betamax and both of the surviviors of those battles were in turn rendered extinct by further progress) .

Did the internet just happen 'by chance' through some form of Big Bang?



ninja edit - I'm not looking for a fight, just some interesting and thought provoking debate

Comparing apples with oranges there though - something created - the internet - but fairly incomprehensible (if that's not a tautology), with something allegedly created & vastly incomprehensible. Survival of the fittest is not fair or correct on technology, because 'dead end streets'  can be resurrected by a creative person in technology (which usually leads to a step change - which doesn't happen in evolution) ' dead end streets' die out in evolution. Yes oversimplifying but you get what I mean I hope. No-one yet has shown evidence of a deity saying those furry creatures with opposable thumbs that I binned for the big tough lizards, lets see what they can do now we've cooled the world down...


I am sceptical about a deity being behind it all, if there is he/she/it has got a lot of explaining to do cause he/she/it seems to be drunk at the wheel. I think the only reason for me not writing off the idea completely is my inability to comprehend the alternative, how things probably do really work.

I am 100% a non-believer in some other blokes way back when knowing the truth & telling us in books which subsequent generations edited for their own purposes which now tell MPs to bring bills encouraging telling girls 'keep your legs shut' as a viable form of stopping teenage pregnancies.

[Rod Paradise]

If David was baiting a hook (and I don't think he was) he caught 2 of the biggest fish straight off :-D

[RED-DOG]

Ok, humour me for a moment...

I lay no claims for any specific deity, nor have I spent time reading Hawking, Dawkins or Cox in depth so bear with me...

As I understand it the argument from the Dawkinistas is that, because the whole thing is so vast, so amazingly complex and so staggeringly difficult to understand, it must have all happened by chance.?

A collision of neutrons or Higgs-Boson bits or whatever; a spot of evolution and here we all are debating how it happened from locations around the world in pretty much real time.

The means by which we now debate this, the worldwideweb, is vast, amazingly complex, and difficult to understand.
and developed, as does much technology through a series of evolutionary changes (survival of the fittest saw off 8track and betamax and both of the surviviors of those battles were in turn rendered extinct by further progress) .

Did the internet just happen 'by chance' through some form of Big Bang?



ninja edit - I'm not looking for a fight, just some interesting and thought provoking debate

Comparing apples with oranges there though - something created - the internet - but fairly incomprehensible (if that's not a tautology), with something allegedly created & vastly incomprehensible. Survival of the fittest is not fair or correct on technology, because 'dead end streets'  can be resurrected by a creative person in technology (which usually leads to a step change - which doesn't happen in evolution) ' dead end streets' die out in evolution. Yes oversimplifying but you get what I mean I hope. No-one yet has shown evidence of a deity saying those furry creatures with opposable thumbs that I binned for the big tough lizards, lets see what they can do now we've cooled the world down...


I am sceptical about a deity being behind it all, if there is he/she/it has got a lot of explaining to do cause he/she/it seems to be drunk at the wheel. I think the only reason for me not writing off the idea completely is my inability to comprehend the alternative, how things probably do really work.

I am 100% a non-believer in some other blokes way back when knowing the truth & telling us in books which subsequent generations edited for their own purposes which now tell MPs to bring bills encouraging telling girls 'keep your legs shut' as a viable form of stopping teenage pregnancies.

Great post Rod.

I have to take this opportunity to tell you that you are one of the most eloquent men (If eloquent applies to the written word) I have ever met.


Don't worry Lil Dave, we'll be back to monkeys and skidmarks before you know it.

[kinboshi]

If David was baiting a hook (and I don't think he was) he caught 2 of the biggest fish straight off :-D

...yes, and I hate discussing religion

[david3103]

Ok, humour me for a moment...

I lay no claims for any specific deity, nor have I spent time reading Hawking, Dawkins or Cox in depth so bear with me...

As I understand it the argument from the Dawkinistas is that, because the whole thing is so vast, so amazingly complex and so staggeringly difficult to understand, it must have all happened by chance.?

A collision of neutrons or Higgs-Boson bits or whatever; a spot of evolution and here we all are debating how it happened from locations around the world in pretty much real time.

The means by which we now debate this, the worldwideweb, is vast, amazingly complex, and difficult to understand.
and developed, as does much technology through a series of evolutionary changes (survival of the fittest saw off 8track and betamax and both of the surviviors of those battles were in turn rendered extinct by further progress) .

Did the internet just happen 'by chance' through some form of Big Bang?



ninja edit - I'm not looking for a fight, just some interesting and thought provoking debate

The basic argument is where is god?  Where was he meant to intervene, and if he is still intervening (monitoring everyone's thoughts, actions, causing plagues and disasters, answering prayers, helping sportsmen win matches and helping people find a parking space at the supermarket when it's raining, etc.) how is he intervening and why did he find it necessary to set up this vast universe and the laws of physics for him to then act outside them?  Why would he bother himself with every individual thought of every one of a species of relatively intelligent primates (well, those who happened to be born in the past 6,000 years, not sure why he wasn't interested in the ones born before then) located on one specific planet orbiting one of the 100 sextillion stars in the universe.

The scientist asks for evidence.  There isn't any.  The believer has his faith, doesn't need evidence. 

Also, if the universe is so complex that it requires a divine super-powered being to create it, then where did this complex divine being come from, because if something that's complex has to be designed and created, then who created god...?

Well, if you put it like that...

I laugh along with the rest of the world when sportspeople attribute their success to a god, or when cures that appear unlikely occur due to 'prayer'.
I see no sign of the traditional Christian God at work in a world full of inequality and pain, nor do I understand how any god could send his people to war with others over minor differences in belief.
But, and maybe this is just the paucity of my understanding, I can't quite grasp the idea that all this - this world, this galaxy, this universe, all those Laws of Physics, all happened, totally, by chance.



As a side note, I'm tired of Tim Minchin's constant thrusting in our face with his Dawkinist views, but 'Thank You God For Curing Sam's Mum's Cataracts' is really rather good.

http://loltheists.com/?p=804

[david3103]

If David was baiting a hook (and I don't think he was) he caught 2 of the biggest fish straight off :-D

No, not baiting, genuinely interested in the responses. We don't get much past titty bars and football in my real world circles.

[RED-DOG]

Ok, humour me for a moment...

I lay no claims for any specific deity, nor have I spent time reading Hawking, Dawkins or Cox in depth so bear with me...

As I understand it the argument from the Dawkinistas is that, because the whole thing is so vast, so amazingly complex and so staggeringly difficult to understand, it must have all happened by chance.?

A collision of neutrons or Higgs-Boson bits or whatever; a spot of evolution and here we all are debating how it happened from locations around the world in pretty much real time.

The means by which we now debate this, the worldwideweb, is vast, amazingly complex, and difficult to understand.
and developed, as does much technology through a series of evolutionary changes (survival of the fittest saw off 8track and betamax and both of the surviviors of those battles were in turn rendered extinct by further progress) .

Did the internet just happen 'by chance' through some form of Big Bang?



ninja edit - I'm not looking for a fight, just some interesting and thought provoking debate

The basic argument is where is god?  Where was he meant to intervene, and if he is still intervening (monitoring everyone's thoughts, actions, causing plagues and disasters, answering prayers, helping sportsmen win matches and helping people find a parking space at the supermarket when it's raining, etc.) how is he intervening and why did he find it necessary to set up this vast universe and the laws of physics for him to then act outside them?  Why would he bother himself with every individual thought of every one of a species of relatively intelligent primates (well, those who happened to be born in the past 6,000 years, not sure why he wasn't interested in the ones born before then) located on one specific planet orbiting one of the 100 sextillion stars in the universe.

The scientist asks for evidence.  There isn't any.  The believer has his faith, doesn't need evidence. 

Also, if the universe is so complex that it requires a divine super-powered being to create it, then where did this complex divine being come from, because if something that's complex has to be designed and created, then who created god...?

Well, if you put it like that...

I laugh along with the rest of the world when sportspeople attribute their success to a god, or when cures that appear unlikely occur due to 'prayer'.
I see no sign of the traditional Christian God at work in a world full of inequality and pain, nor do I understand how any god could send his people to war with others over minor differences in belief.
But, and maybe this is just the paucity of my understanding, I can't quite grasp the idea that all this - this world, this galaxy, this universe, all those Laws of Physics, all happened, totally, by chance.



As a side note, I'm tired of Tim Minchin's constant thrusting in our face with his Dawkinist views, but 'Thank You God For Curing Sam's Mum's Cataracts' is really rather good.

http://loltheists.com/?p=804

Blimey! It's like Francis Bacon meets George Orwell.

[Rod Paradise]

Ok, humour me for a moment...

I lay no claims for any specific deity, nor have I spent time reading Hawking, Dawkins or Cox in depth so bear with me...

As I understand it the argument from the Dawkinistas is that, because the whole thing is so vast, so amazingly complex and so staggeringly difficult to understand, it must have all happened by chance.?

A collision of neutrons or Higgs-Boson bits or whatever; a spot of evolution and here we all are debating how it happened from locations around the world in pretty much real time.

The means by which we now debate this, the worldwideweb, is vast, amazingly complex, and difficult to understand.
and developed, as does much technology through a series of evolutionary changes (survival of the fittest saw off 8track and betamax and both of the surviviors of those battles were in turn rendered extinct by further progress) .

Did the internet just happen 'by chance' through some form of Big Bang?



ninja edit - I'm not looking for a fight, just some interesting and thought provoking debate

Comparing apples with oranges there though - something created - the internet - but fairly incomprehensible (if that's not a tautology), with something allegedly created & vastly incomprehensible. Survival of the fittest is not fair or correct on technology, because 'dead end streets'  can be resurrected by a creative person in technology (which usually leads to a step change - which doesn't happen in evolution) ' dead end streets' die out in evolution. Yes oversimplifying but you get what I mean I hope. No-one yet has shown evidence of a deity saying those furry creatures with opposable thumbs that I binned for the big tough lizards, lets see what they can do now we've cooled the world down...


I am sceptical about a deity being behind it all, if there is he/she/it has got a lot of explaining to do cause he/she/it seems to be drunk at the wheel. I think the only reason for me not writing off the idea completely is my inability to comprehend the alternative, how things probably do really work.

I am 100% a non-believer in some other blokes way back when knowing the truth & telling us in books which subsequent generations edited for their own purposes which now tell MPs to bring bills encouraging telling girls 'keep your legs shut' as a viable form of stopping teenage pregnancies.

Great post Rod.

I have to take this opportunity to tell you that you are one of the most eloquent men (If eloquent applies to the written word) I have ever met.


Don't worry Lil Dave, we'll be back to monkeys and skidmarks before you know it.

I'd more describe it as rambling enough crap that something makes sense eventually but thanks Tom.

[tikay]

Can I Post a photo of an electric bus?

[RED-DOG]

Can I Post a photo of an electric bus?

After the all the effort I put into teaching you, I'm guessing the answer is yes.

[Woodsey]

Can I Post a photo of an electric bus?

After the all the effort I put into teaching you, I'm guessing the answer is yes.

Should only allow if its got skidmarks behind it imo