Ye Religion Thread

[quadz]

I don't believe you can look at human suffering and come to the conclusion a god does not exzist

The conclusion isn't that a god doesn't exist, it's that such a god is probably not worth praying to.


Regards,

quadz

[milhouse]

http://atheistdelusion.cf.huffingtonpost.com/

Checkmate!

hah, that made me chuckle 

I gave up on religion after i saw a picture of the Hubble Deep Field. 

[Jman-CRU]

So god is a higher being whose

[ReCycled]

If you're confused between the nature of the universe and the existence of God - consider this:

[Jman-CRU]

Hehe... I'm a little biased right now. I don't see a string. I only see curves...

Is that due to the observer's selective perception, or the selection of observable matter/object/subject?

(Is this Nick Bostrom's daughter?) 

[ReCycled]

Well I thought the statement was deeper than it first appears. Its saying if you were in a corner of the universe beset by exploding stars, or other instabilities, creation of life (or evolution) could never take place and therefore no discussion about it could exist since intelligent life could not emerge. In the case of the Earth we would not be here if it hadn't been for around 2 billion years of stability within a very narrow temperature band. 10% closer to the sun and the oceans boil - 10% further and they freeze. The universe's temperature scale runs from -450 degrees absolute zero (empty space) to millions of degrees (say the interior of the sun). It seems for life to emerge from the simplest virus to complex mammals you need an extremely long period of time of the same predictable conditions day after day. Under those conditions it seems that life is inevitable.

And don't ask about string theory cause I have no idea what they're talking about.

[DaHanG]

The anthropic principal is more powerful than most probably think. I mean, 100 billion galaxies in our universe. Just think of how many stars/planets are in ONE galaxy. Some people think Earth being 'just the right temperature' is so incredibly improbable. Consider how many damn planets there are... My response to such a silly point of view is 

[quadz]

Plus,

[quadz]

Not meant in a bad way.

thought it was rather sweet, actually


 

[ReCycled]

I haven't read all 96 pages of this thread so I'm sure I'm repeating some thoughts here but, isn't it odd that the concept of God (or gods) still lingers today with billions of people? Religion was conceived thousands of years ago when men still thought the earth was flat, education was non-existent and life (and people) were very simple. It was their way of explaing everything from the creation of everything they saw to their fate when they died. Even the night sky was different. With no lights or electricity to wash it out (like todays cities) looking up at a deep black eternal sky filled with stars would inspire some kind of awe and supernatural thoughts. But with the steady progression of today's science explaining more and more of the known world, its evolution and the nature of the universe - is there really any need to hold onto these ideas of God and creation? For such a large and all-encompassing concept there is an appalling lack of evidence. None at all really. I wouldn't even call God a theory because a theory is at least based on something. The bible isn't a 'something' - its a book written a few milllenia ago by people completely ignorant of all the basic sciences we know today. This is not evidence.
 Its interesting that "God" is always defined in human terms, with humanoid characteristics and human-like decision-making. This is only because humans have invented him. How do they know what this being's nature is?
Because we cannot explain the origin of the universe in terms of Quantum Physics back to the last nanosecond in time, does not follow that God is a viable alternative. I think that at our stage in evolution we are incapable of understanding the complexities and nature of life and the universe even if it was explained to us by superior aliens from somewhere else in the universe. It would be similar to explaining how a computer functions to an Australopithecus. Humans have only been around for 2 million years - a mere spec in time - so we still have more time to get smarter, assuming we survive.

[DaHanG]

The bible isn't a 'something' - its a book written a few milllenia ago by people completely ignorant of all the basic sciences we know today. This is not evidence.

Most reasonable people agree the Bible is not evidence for anything supernatural. Some people confuse humankind's lack of evidence for explaining the nature of the universe with evidence in favor of a creative intelligence (something that must be even more complex and therefore even more improbable). That lack of understanding can be a strong driving force, to which my response is: 

[Jman-CRU]

@ ReCycled: Smile... Of course your statement was deeper than it first appeared. Although winking, so was my answere... Hehe...

The problem I wanted to point out is the

[reaper]

Most reasonable people agree the Bible is not evidence for anything supernatural. Some people confuse humankind's lack of evidence for explaining the nature of the universe with evidence in favor of a creative intelligence (something that must be even more complex and therefore even more improbable). That lack of understanding can be a strong driving force, to which my response is:

[Whirlingdervish]

I agree with you, except for your assumption that a "supernatural" creative intellegence is less probable.

[reaper]

That's not an assumption, it's a logical conclusion

so is belief in god.

One is a stretch of the imagination based on 0 proof and "feelings", the other is supported by every piece of evidence we've gathered so far, and it requires much fewer assumptions to be true.

If you were to elaborate on the "fewer assumptions",  I believe we would find some serious differences in opinion, regarding what is proved, or what is likely.