Religion

[The_old_worm]

I agree , people created religion so that they wouldn't have to face the questions that scare us as humans.

[The_old_worm]

I wouldn't disagree that you are a man, but the point of science is that I'll accept that until there is evidence otherwise and from a scientific point of view so would you. Just like evolution, I accept it as the most probable theory, but leave all possibilities open.  Sorry, evolution is not 99.999999999999999999999% probable.  It is the most likely though.  Assumptions are dangerous and can lead a person to the same kind of single-mindedness and blind faith as the religious.

[Sardauker-Kirov]

Anyways enough about the God Proof thing. Everybody knows Science cant prove god. Maybe he doesnt exist or maybe he does exist. I think he exists. Nema thinks he doesnt exist and so do other people. The other people do think he exists also, Its their Belief.

I think we should change the Topic to some other religious topic's

[The_old_worm]

Better yet, Acriku, How do you know you're a man, do you look in your pants and see your proof?

[Acriku]

How about this Kirov: This is about religion, this is a discussion, deal with it?

Anyways, I agree worm, evolution has a long ways from now of proving itself. But in due time, in due time. And you never know, the government may kill anyone who finds out, and destroy all the material. Because think about it, no religion = a world of confusion, people going insane, etc. I think religion is an asset to the stability of our world. But then again, it could be almost "Heaven" without it. All theoretical.

Edit: I see your point worm, but I sure hope I'm still a man tomorrow.  ;)

[The_old_worm]

How about this Kirov: This is about religion, this is a discussion, deal with it?

Anyways, I agree worm, evolution has a long ways from now of proving itself. But in due time, in due time. And you never know, the government may kill anyone who finds out, and destroy all the material. Because think about it, no religion = a world of confusion, people going insane, etc. I think religion is an asset to the stability of our world. But then again, it could be almost "Heaven" without it. All theoretical.

I agree totally with you there.

[gryphon]

Have you seen some phicology reports released resently that show you can let a persone belive that he or she is excually of the opposite gender. You just have to start when the human is born, if you start any later it won't work.

[ according to the study, witch is pshycology not philosophy ;) ]

In some way I have my doubts about the "real" things. The things we call truths and prove.

[ I'm going to give it a try Acriku ;) ]

Take collors for example. We al know that a certain frequentie of the spectrum is visible for us, we see them as different collors. But we also know that the same waves can be manipulated by for instance distance and gravety.

[ this is famous with NASA who use it to determen the distance of far away stars and systems, the method, "redshift". Things we see as collors are excually NOT collors ]

So theororatically, what we see today can be manipulated at sutch a way that the spectrum changes dramatically and tomorrow we all see different collors in the spectrum that now is "our radio activety" spectrum.

[ the explenation of redshift is better ]

so you can say that we can see the truth around us. But we also know that we can manipulate this truth to look like something else. We can change [ mayby not we but nature can ] visible ligt into a radio wave that we can listen to.

So the only truth seems to be that the wave on itself exists. Not that our "natural" world on itself exists. The fact that we can interact in a world of collors, air, sound etc is that our body is "tuned" [ let's say by evolutional science ] to act, react and handel in this world of ours. Not that "this" is the world. Or as Kant would say [ in German ] " die Welt an sich".

Let's asume that live has origionated as a coincident [ a slight mathematicaly posseblilety that has accured and form our present world with humans, flowers and sutch. Think you get my point. ] That we do exists and the thing I said above is totally crap. Then the tings we see are real for us. And thus are truths for us.

[ I agree with that, but now the tricky part ]

So we have reatched the point that even I say there is sutch a thing of real truth.

But this "real live" [ ie. our univers ] was a mathematical probebilety. Not a certain thing. And the thing created [ our univers ] is a part of something else. something that goes beyond our "real" univers. The thing from witch it was created as a mathematical possebilety.

We thus now have truth, but within certain limits. The limits of our univers.

[ And the funny part of God is that she is beyond our univers. Partially in it and partially outside of it. ]

And I verry mutch agree with Acriku that we have created God because we had problems that we couldn't explain in the past. Like "Am I going to die ?" So the logical "not existing" God is born.

But this has happend in the past, and we can't say or know this for shure. Just as evolution for instance. So the fact that God exists, Yes he does. But the real question. Did we creare God and is she a figment of our imagination or is she real ? is mayby far more important. And if she doesn't exists then we have created the problem ourselfs.

:)

As an extra [ or bonus ] how can we in a natural / material world have a "first order" connection with our own body ?

That we have emotions can be explained scientifically. But that that we experians those emotions.

Now this doesn't mean there has to be a God, but it could suggest there is more than science can give [ offer ] us.

:)

[Acriku]

Very nice insights gryph, I also want to note, science at this moment is basically the "basics". We are not even CLOSE to getting an inkling of the smallest of an inkling of what is going on. But we deal with what we have. Maybe science will evolve, according to our way of thought, and it will fill in the spaces. Maybe that's wishful thinking, but why couldn't it happen?

[The_old_worm]

You'll have to explain further how the Hubble constant(redshift) relates to truth. The paticulars of Light waves certainly have not been figured out, in fact we know very little about light and how it travels.  

You cannot calculate the odds of life on this planet, it may have actually been very likely(I hope you respond to this one, I like discussing probability). You don't need God to buck those odds.

I sincerely hope that your not saying that because we see something or feel something it is truth.  Do you realize how many factors go into sight, sound and smell.  Let's get this straight, what you think you see, smell and hear is just your brains interperetation of stimuli in the atmoshpere.  there are an awful lot of things that can get screwed up in that translation.  That certainly does not represent truth.

I don't get it, you say that we created God to explain things, but then you say that God is real.  Are you proposing that our imaginations created a real being?

Any of your ideas of what truth is can be shot down by simply asking "are you imagining all of this?"  Perhaps it's dope, or schitzophrenia, imagination.  But how can you prove that it's true that your experiences are real, that your feelings are real, that light waves are real and all aren't just a construct of your imagination.  Maybe your just a vegetable sitting in your chair whacked out on thorazine, imagining what it would be like to be a real person.  Again, there are no truths only theories, some more likely than others.  

[Acriku]

Reminds me of an old theory that Aliens are testing us all, seeing what we would do in real world situations, and this is all fake. Holograms and VR.

[gryphon]

You know "The Matrix" [ Yes the film with Neo and Morpheus ]

Did you know that it's based on an acual philosiphical debate started with H. Putnam. Advisor to president Clinton and philosopher. He transformed the "evil demon" from Descartes into an "evil scientist". We whould all be "brains in a vat", [ our brains connected to a computer that controles our "input" and "output" at sutch a acurate way that it would seen like reality to us, as being stricktly and only a brain in that case ] and the evil scientist was

[nemafakei]

We must assume something (else there really is no point). And old worm, I clearly stated that we knew for sure that the book was in one of two places. Therefore nothing else happened to it. Those were the limits of the circumstances the example was based in.

[gryphon]

That's exactly my point Nema. We have to asume somthing. But the "thruth we get from that point on is based on an assumption". So the truth also is an assumption.

Not "real truth". Even if it's science.

:)

[The_old_worm]

The whole point is Nema, how do you know for sure?

[gryphon]

I think that now I don't get what you are saying ? :)

The "lightwaves hyphothese" is to show that "light can not change collor", but light can be something verry different "like a radio signal that your GSM uses to let you communicate". This to indicate that what seems, let's say a round blue table can in just another situation be not "a round blue table".

So I'm saying the same as you are in that [ I think ]. Because with it I say that science isn't absolute. And you say the same thing ?

And we even don't know if there is no real truth. Just as saying God does or doesn't exist we can't say if truth on itself exists.

If our scientific theorys arn't truth they can still be based on some truth.

Like Kant describes, there is a world out there, a world that's as real as it get's. We just have no direct contect with it, no way of seeing it directly, "un prekooked by our own interpretation". The world is a thing that is forever outside our grasp.

And so we will never be able to say if a real truth exists or not. Just as the prove for God.

I know, science and theory's suck don't they ;D

[Acriku]

How do you know that the fact that there are no real truths, is true?

[The_old_worm]

I misunderstood your lightwaves hypothesis. I thought you were useing it as an example of truth, I think, now, that we agree on that.

I'm an agnostic (in case that hasn't been made clear), which means I don't rule out the existance of God, or any possibilities.

[Sardauker-Kirov]

Acriku, never mind. It seems you dont understand what i stated above.

*Shakes his head and rolls his eyes*  ::)

[nemafakei]

Assumptions I mean are things like it's not all a dream, and we're just being set up. That's the road to pandemic paranoia.

Anyway, I agree few things can be totallydepended on as absolute solid truth, but the point is that science is about finding the truth - even though we can only be 90% certain or whatever, at least it tries, and gets fitting results... Religion thinks it (especially its god) knows everything anyway, and doesn't really bother to question itself.

[Acriku]

Exactly, and if we say everything we know is a lie, then we might as well go naked and prance through mud with the pigs. That's why we established "common sense", to assume one thing is obviously correct, and go from there.

[The_old_worm]

To be open to the truth, or what we can comprehend as the truth, you have to accept that other possibilities are out there.

[gryphon]

We just [ almost ] contradicted Gobalopper when saying "are you still using this posts, you are never going to agree with eatch other" [ something almost about that ]. ;D

[nemafakei]

I'm certainly agreed that we do base a lot on human, unreliable perceptions, and that we may have some false data... but remember this is a religion thread, and the way this long diversion began was....

Probably me saying that science is concerned with finding the truth, and religion is about getting people to believe what the religious think they already know.

A lot on the first half - a revision should be "science is concerned with finding the truth, to as great a geegree feasibly possible within our capabilities, assuming things like basic common sense, and even though it may not end up 100% sure it has the correctanswers, at least it has tried."

But do you agree that religion is all about getting people to believe what the religious think they already know?

[gryphon]

In a way, yes agree with that.

[ considering "theology" as the religion, - explained just to be on the safe side - ]

Relgion is far from being perfect as a religion, and based a lot on indoctrination of his own folowers [ and possible potential folowers ].

And I can write another compleat page here on the fact that religion [ as explained some sentences above ] is in fact based on "verry" false assumptions, conclusions and facts. But I'll spare you [ and myself ] that.

Because it comes down to that I agree on a lot more things with you Nema than I've showed in my posts.

It's just my own view that no matter how I look at religioin, from what science or personal believes etc. It still is mystical to me, and that is I think what mayby fasinates me most.

[ I'm not shure but are the first couple of lines an answer to your queston ? ]

:)

[The_old_worm]

agreed, Nema.  that is what I responded to in the first place.  And I made the mistake of not clerifying that it was Human interperetation  of the truth that is fallible. I don't think Humans can absolutely know the truth, but I do think that truth is out there.

To answer your second statement--I agree 100%. It is not only the attempt to brainwash the masses to your beliefs, but also to use that brainwashing for your own ends.  Unfortunatly, power tends to attract the corruptable as Frank Herbert would say, and many in history have abused that power.