Wanted: Honest intelligent productive thinking to resolve the issue God exists or not.

a reply to: pthena

welcome to the bible belt and it's inhabitants then, LOL. (and my grandparents)

The concept of heaven being eternal blissful nothingness (and certainly not a womb, right?)

I think the irony could be is that it's all already true, right? Then we have human nature or whatever.

..and If we are already eternal, then spiritual text is only like a manual, and can only be presented as that in the structure of our nature. Anything more is control or along those lines.

The Eternal was not, is not and will not be. It exists in its existence.

a reply to: akiros

and If we are already eternal, then spiritual text is only like a manual, and can only be presented as that in the structure of our nature. Anything more is control or along those lines.

That's a pretty big if there.

Epicurus taught that the gods themselves were mortal.

For spiritual text some read Lucretius, On The Nature of Things

Being an Earthling, I'm inclined to think of Earth ending when the Sun expands to red giant and the solar corona degrades Earth's orbit, until finally Earth plunges into the Sun.

I don't know eternity.

well, eternal in this sense would mean eternal mortality, meaning you would always be living, and death just a process. So despite this, we would be eternal yet mortal (meaning death isnt a stopping point). Seeing it put this way we can understand how despite being eternal, we would still be eternally faced with the ups and downs of life and technically be 'subject to suffering' ... despite having 'eternal living' since the big nothingness of death doesnt exist.

a reply to: pthena

Well, I had the thought that maybe individuals are collectively bound within a time (in that of humans) So if we were eternally reoccuring, then maybe time isn't linear, but only experienced linear due to our perception of time. Perhaps before we were around, some people escaped the karmic wheel of rebirth and suffering eventually, and time progressed; but is also ironic because of an idea like karma or sin being left up to the individual to deal with. Which could be why enlightenment must be up to the individual and their journey.

Idk though; i dont feel like im getting anywhere with this right now. Will just go ahead and read up on Lucretius.

It's just delightfully strange though, the words that just permeate from an individual that can speak and explain so well despite being alive 2000 years ago. What in the world was living back then like despite being so intelligent I gotta wonder.

final edit, lol

originally posted by: akiros
a reply to: pthena

...

then think about Schrodinger's cat, the theory is (i think?) that the state of the cat, when alone and in a near death situation faced with 1 choice that will determine the outcome of if it survives; the 'programming' of the universe sets both values to being true, the cat is both alive and dead (within the mind, maybe? )with the one choice being the only catalyst to make this chaos rest because nothing can be alive and dead simutaneously. ...

Schrödinger did not wish to promote the idea of dead-and-live cats as a serious possibility; on the contrary, he intended the example to illustrate the absurdity of the existing view of quantum mechanics.[1]

Source: wikipedia (Schrödinger's cat)

Wikipedia also refers to it as a paradox as it explains how "It illustrates what he saw as the problem of the Copenhagen interpretation of quantum mechanics applied to everyday objects." (you can leave out the "what he saw as", although it's not inaccurate, it may give the misleading impression that it's only his opinion, while it's also the fact of the matter)

Synonyms for paradox are: absurdity/contradiction/error/mistake/nonsense.

The part of the Copenhagen interpretation of quantum mechanics that Schrödinger was responding to is in error, i.e. wrong/false/incorrect (that's what Schrödinger demonstrated with his cat example). So if you go down that road, it will only lead to more nonsense or things that have little to do with the reality/truth of the matter.

Neither the Copenhagen interpretation of quantum mechanics nor Schrödinger's cat illustration or paradox has anything to do with choice.

a reply to: Pachomius
No more science fiction than an invisible deity created it. In fact it makes more sense that the Universe, which exist, is responsible for all that now exists than spirit that doesn't exist. Science more support evolution:
- Biology disproves Adam & Eve.
- Cosmology disproves a six day creation.
- Genetics disproves intelligent design.
- Statistics (& reality) disproves the power of prayer.
- Physics disproves a young earth.
- Geology disproves Noah's Flood.
- Neurology disproves the soul.
- Anthropology proves gods are human ideas than can be traced back to the cultures that invented them

...and common sense proves that religious and creationist fundamentalism is bad for society

a reply to: toktaylor

this is so much work and information (though I agree) I just cant help to believe that the underlying truth is vastly more simple.

a reply to: toktaylor

Hehe, I'm reading the universe created itself.

a reply to: Out6of9Balance
Hehe we are reading God created himself/itself/herself....then disappeared from existence no less

a reply to: toktaylor

So the universe created itself you said, hehe!

The common atheist belief.

The universe made itself and then created life in itself. It must be true.

a reply to: Out6of9Balance
If you had been following my post instead of trolling you had learned that the Universe has always existed in some form or other.

a reply to: toktaylor

13.5 billion years I heard. Or what is this universe you are talking about?

Btw, I'm reading I'm a troll, hehe!

originally posted by: whereislogic

Wikipedia also refers to it as a paradox as it explains how "It illustrates what he saw as the problem of the Copenhagen interpretation of quantum mechanics applied to everyday objects." (you can leave out the "what he saw as", although it's not inaccurate, it may give the misleading impression that it's only his opinion, while it's also the fact of the matter)

Synonyms for paradox are: absurdity/contradiction/error/mistake/nonsense.

The part of the Copenhagen interpretation of quantum mechanics that Schrödinger was responding to is in error, i.e. wrong/false/incorrect (that's what Schrödinger demonstrated with his cat example). So if you go down that road, it will only lead to more nonsense or things that have little to do with the reality/truth of the matter.

Neither the Copenhagen interpretation of quantum mechanics nor Schrödinger's cat illustration or paradox has anything to do with choice.

Anybody else find it funny how that first paragraph went from interpretation, to opinion, to "Fact of the matter" ?

Perhaps that's where 'choice' comes into it : making that Evel-Knievel-esque jump of the Grand-Canyon, to believing that our opinion, or a even a partial consensus : is a 'fact' ?

Is it anything more than a tenuous leap-of-faith. resulting in 'facts', that can only ever get partial agreement ?

Perhaps to some of us : those jumps and leaps are paradoxical ?

Synonyms for paradox are: absurdity/contradiction/error/mistake/nonsense.

To bring this around to the subject of the thread : seems to me that it will always be difficult to reach an agreement on whether God exists or not, for similar reasons as alluded-to above.

For me : it means considering the possibility, that some of us can see similar phenomena, and interpret it differently.
Perhaps some of us can see everything that Christian believers, point-to as being signs of God, yet we just don't make that leap from observation, to interpretation, to opinion, to : 'God exists'.

Please don't take this post as focusing on differences, for my real interest is in focusing on our commonalities.

In the natural world : are opinions important ?
Perhaps we are more alike, than different ?

a reply to: Nothin

Anybody else find it funny how that first paragraph went from interpretation, to opinion, to "Fact of the matter" ?

I totally missed it. I was reading the wikipedia article.
I totally don't understand anything with the word Quantum used as an adjective or noun.
I don't understand Astro-physics or how they determine the age of the Universe.
So I'm flexible in my opinions, which can change based upon context.

Please don't take this post as focusing on differences, for my real interest is in focusing on our commonalities.

I am prepared to concede that the difference between myself and an atheist is pretty much a matter of semantics (different words used).

There are words used as attributes for God within Monotheism that have no meaning to me: Omnipotent, Omniscient, Eternal. These seem like completely imaginary notions, with no correlation with nature.

Now having said that, I have no problem listening to the standard Christian Doxology.


However, I am totally averse to the Gloria Patri:

Glory be to the Father, and to the Son:
and to the Holy Ghost;
As it was in the beginning, is now, and ever shall be:
world without end. Amen.

I interpret these two hymns as being completely different.

An atheist has the inability to imagine things they aren’t experiencing. Therefore, they aren’t a reality--to them.

That has a good side and bad side


The good side, if you use it well, can keep one away from presumptuous theories of God, usually the child of religious distortions.


The bad side is it is a one-dimensional materialistic tunnel vision view that can restrict ones growth.


So, when you were a prepubescent child you couldn’t understand sex until those developmental chemicals stormed your system with hormones. Then you understood.


So, the fact that we can’t see God now with either the inner or outer eye doesn’t mean it will never happen.

For believers this is an article of Faith.

They believe in a higher, God system or state, based on the Faith of the possibilities the imagination can now only see partially. Its an admission that "God" can only exist for us fully in the future.

a reply to: Willtell

An atheist has the inability to imagine things they aren’t experiencing. Therefore, they aren’t a reality--to them.

You write that as a statement of fact.
I know atheists. They do not lack imagination.
They are not a group concept. They are individual people.

The OP brought up The 'Four Horsemen of Atheism' : Richard Dawkins, Christopher Hitchens, Daniel Dennett, and Sam Harris.

I read a book by Hitchens and liked it a lot. Saw him on youtubes and he seemed like a jerk. Can't stand listening to Harris. Didn't know anything about Dennett until I read the wikipedia. I think I like his ideas.

Most of my opinions about these individuals are related to whether they value facts. Post Modernism (not that I understand it all) seems to have abandoned facts in favor of opinion, like "There is no truth, you decide your own truth". The other relates to what people call free will, whether an individual can act as a moral agent or not. Harris for one seems to reject that altogether. That's why I can't stand Harris.

Atheists are cool, they allow you to have your own beliefs. Santa Clause is Ģod and the toothfairy too and faith is dead if not an imagination.

Cool guys

a reply to: pthena

Was that a quantized quantum leap, quantoming a quantumality ?

Why is so much importance is given to opinions ?
Do they not change as often as some change socks, or some change cars ?
How then do we decide to call that ephemeral opinion, and call it 'truth' ?
Silly hairless apes, all of us. LoL !

Below and beyond, religions and those common descriptions of God : is there an unspeakable quality, similar to the unnameable Tao ?
Can we vibe and resonate on that ?

God is above humans, above everything, The Most High, there we should be looking.

You could also choose to look above my head but that would be missing the point.

You have to see for yourself.

MONO




Dear everyone, no need to dwell all the time inside your brain, it is the world where you can think up honest intelligent productive thoughts, but alas also all kinds of nonsense and get away with it, even though outside your brain you cannot do something like random mixing of sand and gravel and cement and water, and come out with a live bouncing baby.

Please, every time you produce a thought inside your brain like something that exists and not exists at the same time and in the same sense and in the same place, and you feel so smart, that you can tell yourselves that such a kind of intrinsic contradictory statement can lead to in the infinite dimensions into a baby, but let you try that outside your brain, and see whether you can get anything at all, by which you can buy a doughnut to feed your starving stomach, and you will die sooner than later, and I say, good riddance, you are gone out of existence.

I am not going to venture into you nonsense brain contradiction to point out that you are altogether into nuts jobs all inside your brain and feeling so smart - as all fools feel who take foolishness for some most abysmally extreme efficacious depth of insights like what is the sound of one hand clapping.

Useless to invest time and focus with your guys, come out into the open neighborhood and see whether you can get something done like frying scrambled eggs for breakfast, by occupying your brain with the ‘concept’ of nonsensical random chance, that in the course of infinite duration will bring about what, a three legged frog, of course inside your nutty brain swamp.

If you still feel that you are so smart, then explain to me what is your concept of random chance?


.