Genesis v. Evolution

[Nicolas]

Oops, you beat me to my answer. No lectures though.

An atheist can not understand those last two references,

Because atheists could never understand what faith is like, right?

Your posts have been pugnacious but that is expected from an atheist

"Expected from an atheist"? Really? Are we going there?

[atheists] do love to be antipathetic.

Oh yeah, there's nothing better than a good double shot of antipathy in the morning. You know, for me and the other atheists.

atheists are usually the ridiculers, they must fall into a don't give a damn group.

Damn those atheists!Alrighty! I now belong to your definition of atheists: we are all antipathetic belicose ignorants who don't have a clue of how faith works, even though a lot of us have come from religious backgrounds and experienced the same things religious people did (sometimes even more) but, since we have abandoned our faith for the most different reasons, we're now reduced to a group of people(?) that just can't understand anything. Also, Dawkins. That's a perfect ad hominem right there :thumbsup:.

Sir, please, this was never about me. This has nothing to do with your faith or my lack of it. I never once questioned why you believe in whatever it is that you believe. I never placed in a group of my personal definition of "Christians". Lol, you were actually the one that mentioned Dawkins!

Maybe this is why we diverge so much. We are looking at this through different angles:

The way I see it, we could be two robots. Or a martian discussing with a reptilian. A muslin discussing with a taoist. A hinduist and a wiccan. It doesn't matter! The faiths of the interlocutors are irrelevant to the validity of the argument. It's just two people that read a book and were trying to make a case for what they understood of a certain passage.

On the other hand, the way I see you see this is that only the true believers of your faith are able to understand anything that's written in the Bible. If that's the case, well, then you're right: I'll never understand (different than believe) what you're saying.

I actually don't "need" to prove to you why I believe something, regardless of when or where I state it

I never asked you to prove me why you believe in anything. I recognize faith as human right and you're entitled to it. Again, this isn't about that. I just never understood how you came to that first conclusion. I guess I never will.

If you, as an atheist, refuse to believe there could possibly be a God and therefore the Bible can not be correct in anything that connects that God to any process we observe on the planet, then you can not hope to see those similarities.

This is what I'm talking about. I don't see any reason why a person that doesn't believe in your god, couldn't accept the fact that there are some right or good things in the Bible. I've said it myself a few posts back! This shouldn't be an issue to anyone.Here, I'll even give you a few examples of good stuff I found in the Bible:

Leviticus 19:17 - Don't hate people.

John 13:34 - Love one another.

Romans 12:3 - Don't think too highly of yourself.

2 Timothy 2:24 - Be gentle and patient with all others.

See? It's all right sir... I'm not that atheist that once hurt you. I'm the anthropomorphic elephant in a green suit. On the internet.

Have a nice weekend!

 

[Gpa]

Ah...Now it's semantics. This is fun too.

An atheist can not understand those last two references,

Because atheists could never understand what faith is like, right?

No, because atheists do not have "what it requires" to understand scripture.(You may not understand what I refer to, or why I refer to it as I do, and I will not improve on that answer so, you don't need to ask.)

Your posts have been pugnacious but that is expected from an atheist

"Expected from an atheist"? Really? Are we going there?

Quote the whole sentence; "Your posts have been pugnacious but that is expected from an atheist when it comes to these discussions."and;

Yes, absolutely. I have yet to see an atheist that doesn't argue when a religious context is explored. You are, right now, a perfect example of it.

pugnacious

adjective

1. inclined to quarrel or fight readily; quarrelsome; belligerent; combative.

[atheists] do love to be antipathetic.

Oh yeah, there's nothing better than a good double shot of antipathy in the morning. You know, for me and the other atheists.

antipatheticadjective

1. opposed, averse, or contrary;

The definition fits a lot of people, even me sometimes, but are you saying it "doesn't fit" an atheist when discussing God?

atheists are usually the ridiculers, they must fall into a don't give a damn group.

Alrighty! I now belong to your definition of atheists: we are all antipathetic belicose ignorants who don't have a clue of how faith works, ...

First, I have never seen a group of Christians vehemently attack and ridicule a group of atheists, but I have witnessed, first hand, a group of atheists do just that to a group of Christians. Have you?Second, you added "bellicose ignorants" and I didn't say you or any other atheist, "don't have a clue of how faith works," or even question an atheist's faith... just their ability to understand spiritual matters.

...even though a lot of us have come from religious backgrounds and experienced the same things religious people did (sometimes even more) but' date=' since we have abandoned our faith for the most different reasons, we're now reduced to a group of people(?) that just can't understand anything. Also, Dawkins.[/quote'] I didn't say "a group of people(?) that just can't understand anything." I have only been discussing scripture.

That's a perfect ad hominem right there

"An ad hominem (Latin for "to the man" or "to the person"[1]), short for argumentum ad hominem, means responding to arguments by attacking a person's character, rather than to the content of their arguments. When used inappropriately, it is a fallacy in which a claim or argument is dismissed on the basis of some irrelevant fact or supposition about the author or the person being criticized.[2] Ad hominem reasoning is not always fallacious, for example, when it relates to the credibility of statements of fact or when used in certain kinds of moral and practical reasoning."http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ad_hominem

Basically I said;

Your posts are pugnacious. I believe they are, but that's not a big deal. Others here can decide on their own.

I stated, I expected it. If it has happened before, has a history of occurring, expecting it to happen again and stating so, is not ad hominem.

I said atheists love to be antipathetic. Many people love to be antipathetic. Is stating, someone is opposed to, holds an adverse or contrary opinion of, or generally disagrees with something, now ad hominem?

I actually don't "need" to prove to you why I believe something, regardless of when or where I state it

I never asked you to prove me why you believe in anything. I recognize faith as human right and you're entitled to it. Again, this isn't about that. I just never understood how you came to that first conclusion. I guess I never will.

Where? What are these similarities you talk about?

You haven't demonstrated how and where "Genesis follows evolutionary timeline quite well (considering their level of scientific understanding)" yet.

Since I have read Genesis, and I know these affirmations to be false, the simpler way to demonstrate this was to quote that very book and point out exactly what they got wrong according to what we know of evolution, and that's what I did. I haven't seen you determine what passages match evolution yet.

This is confusing. I'm not claiming anything. You were the one who said' date=' and I quote "Considering the level of scientific understanding at the time, it [Genesis'] follows the evolutionary timeline quite well." I'm only asking you to demonstrate how you came to that conclusion.

You keep saying that, but never actually point it out. What is this reasonable similarity? Really, what is it?

No, I suppose, if we exclude these, you didn't.

I never once questioned why you believe in whatever it is that you believe.

I did not question why you believe as you do.

I never placed in a group of my personal definition of "Christians".

I didn't make a personal definition of atheists. I commented on how I have seen them act.

On the other hand, the way I see you see this is that only the true believers of your faith are able to understand anything that's written in the Bible. If that's the case, well, then you're right: I'll never understand (different than believe) what you're saying.

Yep. That is what I have been trying to say.

If you, as an atheist, refuse to believe there could possibly be a God and therefore the Bible can not be correct in anything that connects that God to any process we observe on the planet, then you can not hope to see those similarities.

This is what I'm talking about. I don't see any reason why a person that doesn't believe in your god, couldn't accept the fact that there are some right or good things in the Bible. I've said it myself a few posts back! This shouldn't be an issue to anyone.

It's not the issue I brought up. I said, "the Bible can not be correct in anything that connects that God to any process we observe on the planet,...".As a result, "...then you can not hope to see those similarities. It won't matter how many times and how many ways I try to show you, you will simply refuse to accept there could be. That's just how it is."

There is no issue.

It's all right sir... I'm not that atheist that once hurt you.

No atheist has ever hurt me... Spiritually or physically. I have no fear of them nor animosity toward them. They're responsible for their own decisions and I am for mine.I suppose I could add here, I find your posts condescending also. I could also wonder, are you actually in any position to be condescending?

I still have enjoyed our discussion. Whether it is pugnacious, or antipathetic, or condescending, is of no consequence.

 

[RainmanTime]

Does anyone actually believe that merely reading a literal interpretation of ONE English translation of the original Hebrew of Genesis is enough to state with certainty there is no correlation between Genesis 1 and modern cosmology and/or evolution?

Sorry Nicolas, but if you are going to dispute the claims of Gpa and/or Thomas Pendrake, then you are all going to have to go back to the original Hebrew. And if/when you do, someone might be a bit surprised. I should point out that the original form of Hebrew is an interesting language because each letter corresponds to three different elements: (1) The natural visual form of the letter itself (physical structure), (2) the sound of the letter when expressed by the human vocal apparatus (sound), and most importantly (3) a numerical value (number). Hebrew is the only language still in existence that we know of that has all three of these associations. And the last one permits numerical permutations with the same value but different letters to provide discovery of deeper meanings which lead to potential different interpretations into other languages. The other interesting aspect of Hebrew is that there are only consonants, no vowels.

Now, one of the interesting aspects of the ORIGINAL Septuagint (first 5 books of the Old Testament) are that they are traditionally viewed as a SINGLE stream of Hebrew letters without any explicit word breaks. This, in and of itself, lends itself to multiple potential interpretations. Interpretations which could yield interesting results. I shall only point to two examples of such interesting results. I deal with the first such example in this post, and then my follow up post will expound on the second one.

The Sefer Yetzirah - This is a book of Qabalistic knowledge which was first referenced formally in the first century of the common era. It is not known exactly how old the text of Sefer Yetzirah (hereafter referred to as SY) is, but given it was referenced this far back it is safe to assume it is at least that old. The very first chapter of SY aligns the first 32 statements of Genesis 1 (known to Jews as Maaseh Bereshit) to the Qabalistic Tree Of Life (and the Tree Of Life is explicitly named in the Genesis 2 story of Adam and Eve). Given that the Qabalistic Tree Of Life can also be shown to be a direct overlay to the architecture of the human body (as shown below), the SY becomes an interesting read into "decoding" a possible technical reading of Genesis with regard to the deeper aspects of Creation. Here is how the Tree Of Life aligns with the human form (i.e. "made in their own image and likeness"):

Now, one of the more interesting analyses of the first chaper of SY is exactly how those 32 statements of Genesis 1 correlates to the Tree Of Life (above) and therefore also the Creation which is the human being. In essence, when you look at the Tree Of Life, there are 10 spheres and 22 paths that connect the spheres, which equals 32. In the Qabalistic tradition they also call the spheres "paths" so to the Qabalist there are a full 32 paths....and those paths specifically align with the 32 statements of Genesis 1. Here is how

a) There are 10 statements in Genesis 1 that, translated into English, are of the form "God said..." Since, as told in Genesis, it was the "sayings" of God that gave rise to the creations of God, then the analyst makes one simplifying assumption, which is that the very first statement of Genesis 1 is assumed to be a "God said..." statement because it is talking about the overall process of God creating that is going to be described. With that one note, here are the 10 "God said" statements, with their associated number being the ORDER in which all the statements of Genesis 1 flow (i.e. if you align all 32 statements in numerical order you will get the order of the story of Genesis 1):

{1} In the beginning God created

{3} God said, let there be light.

{7} God said, let there be a firmament.

{10} God said, let the waters be gathered.

{13} God said, let the earth be vegitated.

{15} God said, let there be luminaries.

{19} God said, let the waters swarm.

{23} God said, let the earth bring forth animals.

{26} God said, let us make man. (Editorial: Please note the PLURAL statement here!)

{30} God said, be fruitful and multiply.

Now....isn't this interesting? When shown in this structured manner, it would be hard to deny that the order of the above "God said" statements do, indeed, parallel the process of evolution in a general sense. Right? But it gets even more interesting when we discover the alignment of the remaining 22 statements of Genesis 1 with the 22 paths connecting the spheres of the Tree Of Life.

b) The 22 paths (and by extension the 22 remaining statements of Genesis) on the Tree Of Life align with the 22 letters of the Hebrew alphabet. Any Jew, or any Qabalist, will tell you that the 22 letters of the Hebrew alphabet (literally in Hebrew Aleph Bet) come in three different types: There are three MOTHER letters (Aleph, Mem, and Shin). There are seven DOUBLE letters (Bet, Gimel, Dalet, Kaf, Peh, Resh, and Tav). They are called "double letters" because their numerical values can take on one of TWO distinct values depending on how these letters are used in a statement. Finally, there are twelve ELEMENTAL letters (Heh, Vau, Zayin, Chet, Tet, Yud, Lamed, Nun, Samek, Eyin, Tzadi, and Kuf).

So here we see that the 22 letters (and thus 22 remaining statements of Genesis 1) are of slightly different forms. The way we see those different forms expounded in the remaining 22 statements of Genesis 1 are as follows:

MOTHER letters correspond to statements of Genesis 1 of the form "God made..."

DOUBLE letters correspond to the statements of Genesis 1 of the form "God saw.."

ELEMENTAL letters correspond to the last 12 statements which all have in common a description of the actions God was taking as creation progressed.

So now, in the same manner as I laid out above with the 10 spheres, now let me do the same with the three different types of paths (letters) with respect to the remaining 22 statements of Genesis. It is left to the student to cut and paste all of these statements and put them in their proper order to see that they do, indeed, show the general order of the Genesis story.

MOTHER letters:

{8} God made the firmament.

{16} God made two luminaries.

{24} God made the beasts of the field.

DOUBLE letters:

{4} God saw the light that it was good.

{12} God saw that it was good.

{14} God saw that it was good.

{18} God saw that it was good.

{21} God saw that it was good.

{25} God saw that it was good.

{32} God saw all that He had made.

ELEMENTAL letters:

{2} The spirit of God hovered.

{5} God divided between the light and darkness.

{6} God called the light day.

{9} God called the firmament heaven.

{11} God called the dry land earth.

{17} God placed them in the firmament.

{20} God created whales.

{22} God blessed them, be fruitful and multiply.

{27} God created man. (Editorial: Note that 27 is three to the power of three.)

{28} In the form of God He created him.

{29} God blessed them.

{31} God said, behold I have given you...

And now, in the above, we have seen ONE EXAMPLE of how the narrative of Genesis 1 can be structurally seen to align with what we consider the modern theory of evolution. Finis - Part 1.

RMT

 

[thomas pendrake]

I notice that Godel's ontological proof has been avoided in the discussion. I again assert that atheism is a matter of faith, blind faith , in fact, since there is absolutely no other basis for it. The Universe abounds with suggestions of a god, and nothing other than faith suggests otherwise. Yes, it is easy to argue that no evidence for any given God other than revelation exists. That is why so many major "intellectuals" have been or are Deists.

 

[kimberlyd]

Over my lifetime (of 30 or-so-years), there has been a change of weather patterns in the UK. When I was a child, the winters used to be harsh and would begin early November with heavy snowfall and the snow would remain until early mid March. In the past 2 years of "winter" in my hometown, there has been literally 3-5 days of snow. Where has the cold winter temperatures gone?I'm no expert and do not know if weather patterns should be fairly consistent, year after year.You're welcome.

I'm a bit at a loss as to how weather changes could be related to this. Weather changes are constant throughout time. Call it growing pains if you will. The weather can never be the same year after year because there are so many other variables involved.

 

[Mylo.X.]

{26} God said, let us make man. (Editorial: Please note the PLURAL statement here!)RMT

Just out of curiousity, what is significant about the Plural statement you refer to?

 

[RainmanTime]

Just out of curiousity, what is significant about the Plural statement you refer to?

Since folks traditionally talk about God as a singular entity, does it not at least spark questions in your mind as to why God, in this statement, would be speaking of itself in the plural? "Let US make man". More than one entity acting as God? Now go back and re-read all the other "God said, God made, & God saw" statements and consider that all of those are plural as well. Is this a clue to the true nature of God that we do not regularly discuss? Qabalists think so.Discuss....

RMT

I deal with the first such example in this post, and then my follow up post will expound on the second one.

This is Part 2. Qabalah is a vast body of knowledge, and in all its vastness one can say that its sole topic is "only" that of Creation...in all its forms, but mostly in how it progresses. But I promised in this Part 2 to give another example of how Genesis 1, as a minimum, reflects a certain aspect of our modern understanding of how the universe was created. In this case we will show a connection to modern cosmology.We know that, in the most read English translation of Genesis 1, that God acted over SIX days to complete the acts of Creation. While you can see that, in the translation of the original Hebrew that I presented in Part 1, that nowhere does it mention those six days, then we should wish to ask "where did that idea come from?" Once again, the study of Qabalah proposes an answer, and once again it relies upon an analysis of the VERY FIRST word of Genesis 1: Bereshit.

There is a very interesting book with a great deal of Qabalistic knowledge written by a friend of mine, Daniel Hale Feldman, who was lucky enough to study Qabalah from a very knowledgeable mentor. The book is titled: Qabalah: The Mystical Heritage of the Children of Abraham. And I would recommend that you get it and read it. However, you can get most of the information from the following website:

http://www.workofthechariot.com

And within one of the pages (I leave it to the reader as an adventure in reading and discovery to find it), it reveals how the mentor analyzed the word Bereshit to arrive at a potential answer to not only "why six days of Creation?" but also to make a connection to our modern understanding of cosmology with respect to the SIX SYMMETRY BREAKS:

The mentor in the Work of the Chariot Trust speculated further on the correlation between Torah B’reshith 1:1-4 and modern scientific cosmology. He based his exegesis upon a different breakdown of the letter sequence of the first line of Torah B’reshith. This breakdown includes an alternative rendering of the first word of the Torah as “Bara-shith” i.e. “IT created Six,” reflecting the six symmetry breaks of modern quantum physics. His detailed exegesis is presented in an appendix in Qabalah: The Mystical Heritage of the Children of Abraham.

We should also note that the Jewish Star of David contains six points and six connecting lines. This is a moniker for the six days of Creation and, by extension of the theory of the Mentor of the Work of the Chariot, also a moniker to the six symmetry breaks of modern physics understanding. Note also that the Star of David can be aligned with the two upper triangles on the Tree Of Life diagram. In essence, these two triangles are trying to represent the unification of The Creator (the upper triangle that points upward) with The Created (the middle triangle that points downward).The remainder of Appendix B (which begins with the "IT created SIX" statement above) expounds on the six symmetry breaks and how they lead to the rest of Creation. I shall not copy them here, and you will have to avail yourself of the book if you are truly interested.

Finis. Part 2.

RMT

PS - When you find the page which I quoted above, the very next paragraph after the one I quoted has some VERY INTERESTING comments about the nature of TIME, and one view of how time can be non-linear. Go find it and check it out!

R

 

[Gpa]

Thanks RainmanTime. I was aware of the Qabalistic Mysteries or Knowledge, but since I don't understand them myself, I couldn't refer to them. I'm glad you have. Great information.

 

[aboleth_lich]

I notice that Godel's ontological proof has been avoided in the discussion. I again assert that atheism is a matter of faith, blind faith , in fact, since there is absolutely no other basis for it. The Universe abounds with suggestions of a god, and nothing other than faith suggests otherwise. Yes, it is easy to argue that no evidence for any given God other than revelation exists. That is why so many major "intellectuals" have been or are Deists.

I confess that I hadn’t addressed ontological arguments earlier as I had to perform some basic research (taking a wee break from my overdue thesis) as to what they precisely say, how valid its statements are, etc. (That, and frankly the tone in this thread grew so downright nasty that I was a bit turned off from wading back into the thick of it—but such is unfortunately the norm in the theism versus atheism debate, as it is after all challenging the fundamental core beliefs of both parties.)Ontological arguments are quite laudable in that they are attempts to verify the existence of a Godly being through abstract reasoning and logic. Regardless, they are ultimately still not particularly compelling and are in fact quite flawed.

To begin, consider the classical ontological proof in its simplest form:

1) Definition: God is the greatest being imaginable.

2) Premise: It is greater to necessarily exist than to not necessarily exist.

3) Conclusion: God necessarily exists.

I.e. God is the greatest being that exists, any being that necessarily exists is clearly greater than one that doesn’t, ergo God must necessarily exist or something else that does necessarily exist could be greater—and it was stated right off the bat that God is the greatest being that exists. It is specious, circular reasoning.

Beyond being an entirely abstract argument with no link to the physical world with which to support it, this argument possesses a fundamental flaw that is best unveiled through a simple reductio ad absurdum counterargument: one could quite easily replace the word “God” with pretty much anything fictional that claims to the greatest what-have-you, note that it is greater to necessarily exist than to not necessarily exist, and thus “prove” that pretty much anything thus necessarily exists! As an especially absurd example: Bizarro Superman claims that he is the greatest being (“Bizarro am Number 1!”). As a being who necessarily exists is clearly greater than one who doesn’t necessarily exist, Bizarro Superman must necessarily exist—as he stated at the very start that he is the greatest being and thus no one can be greater by definition. Again, it is specious, circular reasoning.

It is a common flaw with many arguments based upon formal logic: one can indeed build a sound argument with a conclusion that does indeed logically follow from its axioms, but those axioms themselves must be true for the logical conclusions that follow from them to also be true. For example: All bats are cold-blooded as all bats are mammals and all mammals are cold-blooded. The logical structure is fine, but an axiom and thus the conclusion that logically follows from it are quite false.

Moreover, one could also craft a sound logical argument involving fanciful subjects. As another example: Logic states that Legolas is a fairy given that Legolas is an elf and all elves are fairies, but I have ultimately made a logical conclusion about the nature of a fictional character belonging to a fictional, mythological species.

However, it was specifically Kurt Gӧdel’s far more complicated and mathematical modal logic ontological proof that was being touted. As such, to repute the above simplest form of an ontological proof alone would be a straw man argument on my part.

I fully grant that the impenetrable-to-most mathematical structure of Kurt Gӧdel’s ontological proof has been mathematically verified in modern times (and it took a computer to do so). However, let’s put aside the near impenetrable modal logic notation of Gӧdel’s proof aside and examine it in as close to “plain English” as possible:

1) If property A is positive, and if property A entails property B, then B is positive. (It doesn’t specifically matter to this proof what these properties are, or what “positive” means so long as “positive” adheres to what follows below. In fact, we’re free to have non-existent properties entail further non-existent properties.)

2) If property A is positive, then the property not-A is not positive. (Who could argue against that? It essentially goes without saying.)

3) The property G is a positive property. (As proof of a Godlike being necessarily existing, G would be the property of being Godlike. Moreover, at that point it is said that G has all of the positive properties as it is the greatest being imaginable, after all. Again, we have stated that “God is the greatest being.")

4) If a property is positive, then it is positive in all possible worlds. (To extend the potential existence of a Godlike being possessing all positive properties to every corner of the multiverse, every plane of existence, etc to truly cover all of the bases imaginable—I presume.)

5) Necessary existence is a positive property. (Again, “it is better to exist than not-exist.”)

The validity of its modal logic structure aside, Kurt Gӧdel’s ontological proof regardless essentially boils down to the same argument as above with a few additional steps and provisions that ultimately change nothing: God is declared to be the greatest being imaginable (this time in all possible worlds and possessing all positive properties—which naturally follows from being the greatest), it is better to necessarily exist than to not necessarily exist, and thus God must necessarily exist otherwise something else that exists could be greater—defying our baseless definition of a Godlike being. Like any proof, Gӧdel’s ontological proof holds true if and only if its axioms are indeed true—and I and other atheists are simply as-of-yet not convinced that those axioms are indeed true.

Moreover, even if we are to accept Kurt Gӧdel’s axioms and thus his proof: it only proves the necessary existence of a Godlike being. Having that Godlike being be Yahweh is thus far no more or less valid than having it be Odin, Zeus, or some deity as-of-yet unimagined and unnamed by man. Indeed, to state that it is Yahweh would be quite the leap of faith.

Furthermore, as a tangent: I’m also fairly skeptical of the claims that observation is some key, underlying principle of physics and that the universe must have some observing consciousness for it to even exist. (It does seem that such an underlying principle of physics would have been mentioned repeatedly during my academic career in the applied sciences.) However, I’m admittedly as-of-yet unfamiliar with Dr. Wheeler’s lecture beyond that vague synopsis provided thus far and as such cannot rightfully criticize it any further at this time.

Ultimately, I highly doubt that there any arguments that could be presented within this thread that could convince an atheist of the existence any Godlike being let alone that the said being would be Yahweh rather than Odin, Zeus, or what-have-you: not Pascal’s “I better believe just case the threat of Hell is indeed real” Wager, the notion that smarter scientists and intellectuals than us are convinced theists (as there are also plenty of other scientists and intellectuals also smarter than us who are convinced atheists or at least agnostics as well—as previously noted in the 15th post of this thread), not the even-if-not-taken-literally mythology of one-of-out-many cultures nor the poetry of its ancient tongue nor the rather forced analogies and coincidences between it and modern science, not analogies replacing the creator of man with extra-terrestrials, not the difficulties a childlike mind may have describing metamorphosis, and not a structurally sound version of the ontological argument that’s regardless still based upon unproven axioms.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6j8Babr_n4w In light of a lack of such evidence, the blind faith that is indeed ultimately required for theism when the aforementioned arguments are boiled down, and moreover the clear flaws and man-made nature of every proposed religion thus far: it seems more likely to atheists that there is no godlike being. That is the essential basis of atheism, and if critics wish to characterize that as stubborn blind faith on par with a creationist’s adherence or as an excessively argumentative condescending arrogance then there’s little that can be done to convince them of otherwise. It is equally unlikely that any arguments could be presented within this thread to conversely convince a theist of the nonexistence of a Godlike being. Ultimately, we may just have to simply agree to disagree and leave it at that.

It does seem that we at least agree that any religion that stands counter to- and vehemently opposes- clearly demonstrable and verified modern science is clearly “bad religion,” and there is indeed a conflict between proponents of “bad religion” and science (specific examples having been provided in my last post in this thread). As for “bad science” being that which does not permit the existence of a godlike being, I would say that the existence of a Godlike being is totally irrelevant to the bulk of science and moreover proper science should develop irrespective of the scientist’s biases—including religious beliefs and the lack thereof. The "bad science" of a proper scientific disproof of a Godlike being, or a fundamental scientific theorem that totally discounts the very remote possibility of a Godlike being, is about as likely as the precise opposite—after all, it is exceedingly difficult to prove a negative.

 

[Gpa]

1) If property A is positive, and if property A entails property B, then B is positive. (It doesn’t specifically matter to this proof what these properties are, or what “positive” means so long as “positive” adheres to what follows below. In fact, we’re free to have non-existent properties entail further non-existent properties.)2) If property A is positive, then the property not-A is not positive. (Who could argue against that? It essentially goes without saying.)

Although your post is exquisitely verbose, your logical arguments are invalid. Your tautology is flawed. I'd show you why, but that would take all the fun out of it. Make it a learning experience.

 

[thomas pendrake]

I believe that I explicitly stated that Godel's proof and Dr Wheeler's statement about God as the observer were basically Deist. Dr. Wheeler was, in fact , a Unitarian/Universalist. And Dr. Wheeler's views are easily verified, as he is one of the most influential Physicists of the 20th century, and probably the most important cosmologist.

I wonder if aboleth_lich took any physics classes, or just slept through any parts relating to quantum mechanics. Here kitty, kitty, Schrodinger's kitty. The rationalist view, there is no god, therefore there is no god, is a prime example of why rationalism is totally invalid for any logical argument. Go back to Gallileo's observations about the heliocentric solar system and the tower of Pisa experiment (which is the eventual basis for the general theory of relativity) , stir in Relativity and quantum mechanics, and we have sound rejection of rationalism. And atheism is thoroughly rationalist, period.

 

[aboleth_lich]

If there was indeed something mistaken about the logical arguments and/or tautology within my examination of Kurt Gӧdel’s ontological proof, either one of you could have proceeded to briefly outline what those mistakes were and further the conversation as such (even though that would have apparently "taken the fun out of it"). Instead, both of you opted to be quite needlessly, childishly condescending--which is exceedingly hypocritical given your recent complaints about Nicolas being condescending towards you in his posts.

Since it has been quite rudely wondered aloud whether or not I took any physics classes or merely slept though any parts relating to quantum mechanics, I shall clarify the matter: I completed numerous physics classes throughout my B.Sc. and M.Sc. in electrical engineering and my ongoing Ph.D. in engineering science. I moreover performed quite well in all of them, maintaining an A level GPA. (I've furthermore guest lectured for a course on semiconductor device physics on multiple occasions throughout my ongoing Ph.D.) At no point during these courses was the observing consciousness of the universe ever discussed, which is surprising given that such is apparently a fundamental underlying principle of physics. Would you have made the same snide comment about Dr. Lawrence Krauss, Dr. Stephen Hawking, or Dr. Carl Sagan as world-renowned physicists who are (or were in the late, great Carl Sagan's case) also vocal atheists? Does their rationalism imply that they clearly also slept through their physics classes?

It's a bit of a shame. A serious, mature conversation of this topic could have been rather interesting (a welcome occasional distraction from furthering my thesis at least), but as it is I have little interest in participating further if this is the immature level of "discourse" that I can expect from this thread. Good day gentlemen, I leave you to being needlessly rude and condescending to those who disagree with you whilst simultaneously and hypocritically complaining about how exceedingly rude and condescending the people who disagree with you are.

 

[Gpa]

If there was indeed something mistaken about the logical arguments and/or tautology within my examination of Kurt Gӧdels ontological proof, either one of you could have proceeded to briefly outline what those mistakes were and further the conversation as such (even though that would have apparently "taken the fun out of it").

You seemed so sure of your logical presentations, I naturally felt that you would want to reexamine them and correct any possible errors. I find learning enjoyable (fun) so I didn't want to "take the fun out of it" for you.

Instead, both of you opted to be quite needlessly, childishly condescending--which is exceedingly hypocritical given your recent complaints about Nicolas being condescending towards you in his posts.

We all know "Sheldon" has a problem with sarcasm, could I have a problem with condescension?"Although your post is exquisitely verbose, your logical arguments are invalid. Your tautology is flawed. I'd show you why, but that would take all the fun out of it. Make it a learning experience."

Is this somehow condescending? I don't see where I "placed" myself "above" you.

Do you mean, "exquisitely verbose"? Well, it's just my opinion. Is it rude? Well, maybe some might see it as such. I have been called rude before. Ok, I'll concede to "rude".

Good day gentlemen, I leave you to being needlessly rude and condescending to those who disagree with you whilst simultaneously and hypocritically complaining about how exceedingly rude and condescending the people who disagree with you are.

I don't think I complained. I just pointed it out. It happens in discussions like these. I just roll with it. Have I submitted posts that may be considered rude, condescending, mean, or in any other offensive manner? Yea, some definitely are, some are considered that way by the subject in or of the post. You should see some of the posts I wrote just to vent and deleted without ever posting.I tend to call things as I see them and be as truthful as my knowledge and understanding will allow.

 

[Mylo.X.]

Since folks traditionally talk about God as a singular entity, does it not at least spark questions in your mind as to why God, in this statement, would be speaking of itself in the plural? "Let US make man". More than one entity acting as God? Now go back and re-read all the other "God said, God made, & God saw" statements and consider that all of those are plural as well. Is this a clue to the true nature of God that we do not regularly discuss? Qabalists think so.Discuss.... RMT

My speculative thoughts on the meaning of that particular verse are as follows:When god says let "us" make man, god is making an annoucement to extra-terrestrials. What I mean by extra-terrestrials is "not-of-this-earth" or terrestrial planet (whatever the angelic beings maybe). If I'm correct in the next verse, no-where is it implied that "they" created man, but rather "god" created man. So basically, I understand that verse to be a kind of one way dialogue between god and others, and the actual creation (mentioned a little later in the next verse) was undertaken by the singular entity, referred to as god.

 

[thomas pendrake]

Of course, aboleth_lich, your command of logic clearly surpasses that of Kurt Godel, I congratulate you. And, again, I am astounded that a person with the education you claim could have missed the entire discussion which usually dominates any class about quantum mechanics regarding the Copenhagen interpretation . I notice that the mention of Schrodinger's cat went unmentioned. Get over it, Rationalism began it's fall with Gallileo, and Kurt Godel delivered the coup de grace. And Einstein clearly disdained it. All of his work was totally empiricist.

Your statement about Dr. Carl Sagan reminds me of an article which appeared in the William and Mary newspaper about an interview of Dr. Rolf Winter after he was appointed Chairman of the Physics Department. It purported that he was an atheist. He wrote a brief letter to the paper (Which the English Department declared as one of the best letters ever written in the English language.), in which he basically said that nothing in the article was in the interview, and nothing from the interview was in the article. I knew from class and personal discussions with Dr. Winter that he was absolutely not an atheist, and that he felt that the Copenhagen interpretation, or quantum mechanics in particular, demands a god to observe the universe. Dr Sagan has been widely quoted as NOT being an atheist, and even regarding atheism as being "stupid". He specifically said that he was agnostic as opposed to being an atheist. Perhaps you may wish to research his comments, and consider whether you are agnostic, or so absolutely brilliant and full of special knowledge that you can KNOW as a fact that there is no god.

My speculative thoughts on the meaning of that particular verse are as follows:When god says let "us" make man, god is making an annoucement to extra-terrestrials. What I mean by extra-terrestrials is "not-of-this-earth" or terrestrial planet (whatever the angelic beings maybe). If I'm correct in the next verse, no-where is it implied that "they" created man, but rather "god" created man. So basically, I understand that verse to be a kind of one way dialogue between god and others, and the actual creation (mentioned a little later in the next verse) was undertaken by the singular entity, referred to as god.

Perhaps He was speaking in the "pluralis majestatis". If mere human kings, and a lot of other people with inflated egos, can use the "royal we", certainly God can.

 

[Darby]

Aboleth and Tom,

For Christ's sake. The two of you have your PhD's which means that you've both been required to teach physics and/or engineering. Stop quibbling over trivialities and look up at the top of the page for the topic of this thread.

We have victims of the public education system debating whether the sun orbits the earth or the earth orbits the sun and you two are debating rationalism and name dropping from your CV's while these people wander through the Dark Ages, fat, dumb and illiterate. Wake up, toss your egos in the dust bin and take a minute to teach. And I mean teach the physics of orbital mechanics - not freshman pseudo-philosophy.

 

[Nicolas]

Good morning!

Wow, what a productive weekend for everybody here!

Anyway, lets get to it. Out of all the quoting of quoted quotations, I find the next one to be the one worth mentioned, since this thread has become a bit clogged, visually speaking.

I stated, I expected it. If it has happened before, has a history of occurring, expecting it to happen again and stating so, is not ad hominem.

Oh yeah it is. Specially because labeling me as this or that, had nothing to do with the original argument. We steered away from it because we couldn't kill it in the first few posts, which could've been easily done. Instead, we lost time establishing I'm the atheist that lacks all sort of skills to understand what a christian has to say about his faith.

First, I have never seen a group of Christians vehemently attack and ridicule a group of atheists, but I have witnessed, first hand, a group of atheists do just that to a group of Christians. Have you?

Heck yeah I have! Myself and basically all atheist I know. But see, this has absolutely NOTHING to do with the original question. Bringing this up and putting me in the group of people that has attacked you before, has exactly zero relevance to both sides of the argument.

No, I suppose, if we exclude these, you didn't.

I didn't ask you to prove to me your belief in Jesus, the Bible or God. I'll repeat, in my opinion, this is all irrelevant for what was being questioned here. In all of those quotes from me that you posted, I was asking for an explanation of how you came to the original conclusion. I just wanted to understand what you were saying. Not questioning your beliefs.

Yep. That is what I have been trying to say.

Well, that was disappointing.

Sorry Nicolas, but if you are going to dispute the claims of Gpa and/or Thomas Pendrake, then you are all going to have to go back to the original Hebrew.

Well thank you, that's exactly what I've been trying to say! The Bible as we know it, is nowhere near the definition of a reliable material when it comes to match it against what we already know of the world. You had to go through all that trouble of translation, multiple interpretations, aligning verses with a drawing of a "Qabalistic Tree of Life" just to make it "parallel the process of evolution in a general sense".




Good job by the way. I never heard of the existence of Sefer Yetzirah and everything else you posted. Learned something new today :thumbsup:

 

[RainmanTime]

You had to go through all that trouble of translation' date=' multiple interpretations, aligning verses with a drawing of a "Qabalistic Tree of Life" just to make it "[b']parallel the process of evolution in a general sense".[/b]

You are ignoring, of course, the very real probability that the original organization of the 32 statements of Genesis 1 were actually purposefully aligned with the Tree Of Life (something which is discussed in Genesis 2, BTW) to convey some knowledge about evolution (i.e. Creation). Because, you see, writing something down is actually about conveying knowledge. Now, you seem to have taken the position that Genesis 1 is NOT conveying knowledge about evolution (i.e. Creation). Yet, I have shown you that clearly, it does, when you avail yourself back to the basics of the original Hebrew letters/language.And in the above, you are selecting the easier of the two probabilities to dismiss. Namely, that someone took the words of Genesis 1 after the fact and "forcibly" aligned them to the Tree Of Life. Would you now like to address the more difficult to dismiss probability that Genesis 1 was purposefully structured in this manner to actually reveal something about the Tree Of Life (which is, as I have shown, a de facto architectural model of the human organism), and therefore evolution (i.e. Creation)?

BTW,

I have formally requested that Cosmo break out the Genesis v. Evolution discussion into a separate thread, as per suggestion from Gpa, starting with post #89 in this thread, which is where Thomas Pendrake first brings up Genesis. I think it is appropriate to separate that discussion from the "earth is the center of universal rotation" discussion.

RMT

 

[Cosmo]

Thanks for the heads up guys! I've branched this discussion off into its own thread so the original one can stay alive.

I appreciate everyone keeping it civil - Debates mixing science and religion in most capacities often don't end well, so thank you everyone for helping me maintain my sanity

 

[thomas pendrake]

Although the question of the principle of evolution and Genesis (as well as the other creation accounts in the Bible) is interesting, it misses the more important question of Rationalism vs. Empiricism in modern science, which is the core question in the geocentric vs. heliocentric discussion. I originally brought up the topic in response to the anti-religion remarks based on one narrow interpretation of one of the many creation myths in the Bible (which is only one, albeit the most widely used, holy text). As a Christian, I point out that a major tenet of the Christian faith is that the "Jewish myths and fables" are not the basis of Christianity. Indeed, many early Biblical scholars rejected this portion of the scriptures. I have long argued that the entire religion vs. science debate is ultimately based on ignorance of both topics. I am not alone , by any means, in that argument.