View Full Version : The Big Bang and God
I just wondered what you would have to say about the Big Bang vs God and Creation.
For me.. I dont believe in the Big Bang at all. I look at the Big Bang as a "lack of options". Does anyone have anything to say about that?
Well, there is no real need to "believe" in the big bang like you need to believe in God. It is just a theory that kosmologists use to explain certain fenomena that they observe while looking at the universe.
If you want to throw the big bang theory away you'll just have to come up with different explanations as to how cosmic background radiation is so smooth in all directions of space, you also need to explain how far a way galaxies have these huge redshifts in their light and while you are at it give a good explanation why hydrogen and helium seem to make up for 99% of all visible matter and why 75% is H and 25% is He. While you are doing that you might as well tell us where all this stuff comes from ?
If you can give a consistent explanation for these fenomena without having to use a big bang then you just made your own rival theory. This of course has to make predictions and these have to be checked with observable fenomena.
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we are midgets standing on the backs of giants,
Plato
[This message has been edited by Plato (edited June 04, 1999).]
Hmm.. that is a good point, but my point it that how can anyone know if there was a big bang or not? Isnt universe supposed to be 16 billion years old?
Back in the days when people thought that the sun went around earth, and every object on the sky was going around earth.. it took a while to get rid of that theory.
But since you know so much about the big bang, then explain all the things you just asked me to explain.. I cant explain it, that is why i ask, and i cant really believe that universe was created in a big bang, then there has to be a center point right? and since we have no idea how big this universe is, then how can we start thinking about how it was created? as for all the theories and all that we are saying about it all, nothing is more than educated guesses.
But maybe you can "convert" me. I have little, or no explanation to how it all came about, but still i think i am allowed to question the theories of today..
In case you actually do want to learn a little bit about the Big Bang cosmology (including the answers to Plato's questions), here you go:
http://www.bowdoin.edu/dept/physics/astro.1997/astro4/bigbang.html
Although, there are plenty of detractors for the Big Bang, and about a million alternative theories floating about. Here's a typical example:
http://www.angelfire.com/az/BIGBANGisWRONG/index.html
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I am; therefore I think.
Plato
I just wanted to thank you for clearing my mind.. I am still reading from those links, and i have to say that i am even more confused than i was before i started this one. man i am learning something new everyday :-)
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I doubt, then i might be
Opps.. that one was meant for Boris :-s
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I doubt, then i might be
Why don't we all just shut up about how other people believe something that is wrong. Some of you are just acting like children. Myself, yes, I am a Christian, but I'm not saying that you cannot belive the Big Bang theory. I don't really care. So what if the scientists are wrong or if those that believe in God are wrong. I do believe that God created everything, but how he did that is beyond the comprehention of and human, or any other form of life for that matter. I have always thaought that there is a happy medium. You have got to figure that since God Knows what we know and more, he is the greatest scientist of all. And I'm sure that somehow his amazing knowlege of science helped him create something. Think about it, though. In the end, does it really matter how the universe was created or how it will end. Either way, we are never going to be able to stop it. You cannot deny the inevitable. You all just want to think that you know everything, and the Big Bang Theory is just another thing that you can get ticked off about so that you can try and prove someone else wrong. You should also think, though, about all the scientists who have become Christian because they cannot find a "logical" explanation to the begining of the universe.
If it really matters how God created the universe you mean? Offcourse it matters. It would tell us who we are, what we are doing here, maybe how we got to be, and all the other questions man is asking himself.
Cant i ask questions? Get some input from all the intelligent people that I am addressing my opinions too? If I cant do that while at the same time learning from all the others posting messages in this forum, what is the reason to live then?
I feel that the moment i stop asking questions about things that i want to know more about, i would not live, learn, I would just be.
As for all the scientists that became Christians because they could not find any logical explanations, they stopped asking questions, stopped to learn about the "truth" and learned about what I believe ( me) is "the book with no answers" if there were answers there, then we would all know.
Lori. If you read this.. please give me your input.
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Using BeOS R4 with Netpositve 3.03d
I'm sorry. I didn't try to make it seem as though you could not ask questions. I suppose my response was not really directed to you. It is more or less directed to some of the people who are out there reading this. I have known people who get in fist fights over this sorta thing. I think it is great that you are asking questions. I just believe that as a Christian, all of this will come together when I die. Because then, I'll get a chance to ask questions to the one person who did it all. You do have a very good reason for asking such a question. I did not fully understand your reason for asking it at first. Some people just want to know so that, as I said last time, they can find kthe key to saving the universe or simply so that they can argue. So I would like to say again, I truly am sorry for coming off too harshly.
I am sorry that i came on too hard too "Shorty" I guess i didnt make such a clear post when i started this thread.
I am not a christian, but i believe in God in my own way, but when your and my time is up on this planet, i hope that you, me and everyone else gets to know what all this is about :-)
I havent noticed that people gets into fights about this, but if they do, then i feel that they have missed the point. Be nice, ask questions if you have any, and try to learn something from it all :-)
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Using BeOS R4 with Netpositve 3.03d
Odysseus
06-20-99, 09:04 PM
I'm not concerned by the Big Bang, or Evolution, or any of the boogeymen that are somehow supposed to disprove or invalidate Christian beliefs. I'm not one of those people who insist the Bible can be taken literally in every detail, nor am I one of those people who discard it. Consider: God has a problem of imparting the wisdom of his omniscient mind to our tiny little finite brains. Thus the language of the Bible is often "allegorical" in a sense because earthly language simply is incapable of communicating what God has to telll us. Thus the Bible can be at one and the same time (as I qualified, "in a sense") allegorical and literally true.
While I share their faith, I get impateint with those who limit God by trying to dictate how he does his work. He works THROUGH nature as well as (occasionally) OUTSIDE nature in miracles. I won't be so arrogant as to tell God how to do His business. Nor should you.
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May you be in Heaven a half an hour 'fore the Devil knows you're dead
generalhurrss
06-20-99, 10:40 PM
If you want to know what god wants from us, try reading exodus, here he lays down the law with Moses and puts forth the ten commandments.
There are millions of people who believe in god but don't know what the rules are or what they are supposed to benefit by those rules.
The icon of Mary and baby Jesus was changed from the original concept of Eros and Cupid, how wonderful the christians can bend things and blind us by twisting ancient religions.
Odysseus
06-21-99, 03:12 AM
Generalhurrss,
There is another Christian belief in contrast to the one you myopically fixate upon.
Pagans often like to attack Christianity for it's appropriation of the iconography of older beliefs, and attempt to dismiss it upon that basis. However, there is another way to look at that, one that was articulated by the poet Milton and also given credence by the great lay theologian C. S. Lewis. According to many believers throughout the history of Christianity, the reason for the similarity between, say, Jesus and Dionysus, and Christ and the old dying gods of the fertility religions lies in the fact that Jesus didn't come to make all the old beliefs totally obsolete, BUT TO FULFILL WHAT WAS TRUE AND GOOD IN ALL OF THEM. Under this doctrine, all the old religions...even the oddest of them...possessed some glimmering of the truth of which Christ is the fullfilment. As a Christian, that is what I believe. Christians who hold this perspective can accept even the existence of the
"old" gods and nature deities...Lewis states in his writings that the only sin in believing in in the existence of such is to make the mistake of confusing them with and oputting them in the place of their Master, the Lord Jesus Christ. The Bible itself states there are "powers and principalities" of evil, and thus there may be their equivalents who are obedient to the overlordship of Jesus. I have never seen a satyr or a dryad, or encountered Wotan or Shiva, and don't ever expect to. But if I did, and I were to find such creatures were real, I would have no trouble accommodating their existence within the Christian faith as either faithful servants of God under his rule, or former rebellious servants of God now under the command of the Adversary. Man may be God's ultimate creation, but we certainly are not his only ones, and there may be other beings he created for His purposes that are simply none of our business.
generalhurrss
06-21-99, 07:44 PM
Odysseus,
Then why is the 25th of December recognised as the birth of Christ when it has been calculated in the bible that he was not born on this day. It does not even give you Christ' birth date and yet millions of people accept that this is his birth date.
Saturnalia day was celebrated on the 25th and there is no mention of Christ in this title.
In religion people believe anything and need no proof and ask no questions about their god simply out of blindness.
ALso, god asks no one to kneel before false icons. The icon of Mary and Jesus are false icons. You kneel before and answer to only one and one only - god.
CMPHONEIX
06-21-99, 08:21 PM
Ok. I really think I had better clear something up FOR EVERYONE here.
Are you listening?
When you refer to the Pope, that's the catholic part of Christianity, Protestants are not in that whole holy hierchy thing.
So Boris, for me, a Protestant, when the pope said evolution was a truth, that ment very little to me, he is not an authority in the Protestant part of Christianity.
Also Protestants don't prayor bow to Mary or ANY of the saints. Atleast not the sincere ones.
The reason the Catholics do that is because they are asking those saints to pray for them. It's kinda like me asking you to help me with a problem I have.
But you're right, I don't go for that whole, kneel and pray to the saints thing. It comes too close to breaking that commandment, and putting an imperfect being next to a perfect one.
Hey is just me, or when evolutionists get backed into a corner do they start bashing the Bible or what?
PS>Plato no offense intended OK? I just had to make a few differences clear.
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*ENLIGHTEN ME*
>CMPHONEIX-----------------------------------
How About this guys ...
The big bang did occur and it was God's intention?
H-kon,
I kind of have to agree with the notion that it really doesn't matter all that much to us whether there was a big bang or not. And I also like the cow's idea, and tend to agree. Really, in my own life, I understand my own limitations, and those of others, and I really don't have the time or know how, or energy to argue or prove every single little thing that it says in the Bible. And why should I? I have enough trouble trying to get along with my husband and keep a roof over my head. I don't think that the most efficient way of "getting religion" is by trying every known method of disproving it, and then eventually giving up. I think that it's much easier and clearer to put Biblical principles to work in your own life, and then see and experience the overwhelming benefits. Follow the laws, or don't follow the laws, and then see what happens. Now, that's an experiment we can all perform, and we don't even need to be scientists. For example, the best thing I ever learned how to do, and what has benefited me most in my life, and what "proved" religion to me, was the concept and practice of forgiveness. One of the most powerful principles there is in the Bible. Prayer works as well. It's not just coincedence, but I'm afraid that unless you believe in it, you can't practice it, and if you can't practice it, then you can't see the results. But I can see the results in my life, and that is undeniable.
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God loves you and so do I!
I'd like to, once more, throw a wrench into some of those Christian wheels. (Sorry, couldn't help it! ;))
Quoting Odysseus (sorry for the long quote, but it's fairly representative of many similar statements):
Consider: God has a problem of imparting the wisdom of his omniscient mind to our tiny little finite brains. Thus the language of the Bible is often "allegorical" in a sense because earthly language simply is incapable of communicating what God has to telll us. Thus the Bible can be at one and the same time (as I qualified, "in a sense") allegorical and literally true.
What about the language of mathematics???! You know, that universal language that science has discovered, and in which the ETs make Contact happen? Was God not intelligent enough to conceive of giving the anscients a precise mathematical document, which would be impossible to corrupt through misinterpretation or translation -- because there would be only *one* way to read it? If God could create Earth, why couldn't he just put a Big Diamond Mountain of Divine Truth on it to last a trillion years, and inscribe mathematically and irascibly on the perfect face of that mountain everything he needed to tell the generations to come? Why play the grapewine game?
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I am; therefore I think.
[This message has been edited by Boris (edited June 24, 1999).]
Odysseus
06-24-99, 09:42 PM
That's too small a wrench for some pretty big wheels. ("The mills of the gods grind slowly but they grind exceedingly small")
As for mathematics, I'm not sure you or anyone else can make the bald statement that it is an infallible tool to reveal ultimate truth. It serves us well, but just because you seem to perceive it as having no limitations doesn't mean it has none. It's also totally bloodless (can't resist a gentle barb; as you too often seem to be.) If you were dealing with a population of Asimovian robots, equations might indeed suffice for holy writ----but instead, the audience is made up of beings who not only think but feel, who have emotions. The frosty precision of mathemtics is in no way emotionally satisfying for other than a few pathological cases like the Unabomber. Not only that, mathematics advanced enough to transmit such complex and intricate concepts and relationships would almost certainly be beyond the understanding of those famous tiny little finite mortal brains (possibly even yours, you think?} I cited before. Stephen Hawking and a few others of that mental capacity might be the only adherents of such a religion.
Also, to a point Milton made in "On His Blindness" God doesn't need slaves or servants. If what I believe (and what hundreds of millions of other believe, which you so blythely dismiss---takes a real hefty dollop of arrogance to consider that many of your fellow creatures abject fools, while you---being the clever fellow you are---have figured everthing out) is true, there are uncounted billions of created beings to do His bidding at His slightest gesture. He wants fellow beings, lesser than than Him but greater than the angels, who will submit freely to His will out of love and reverence. Fellow beings possessed of free will with whom he can commune...even argue...as he did with some of the figures in the Old Testament. God's creation of humankind (and it bothers me not one whit whether that was accomplished in an instant by special creation or over billions of years through evolution) was not an act of pride and exuberance, but an act of incredible sacrifice and self-abnegation. If He wanted, the whole cosmos could dance in total obedience to His every wish. Instead, He made "a little lower than the angels."---and gave us free will to fully share the wondrousness of His creation.
Stick to your cold, bloodless, Hobbesean conception of the cosmos. YOUR loss, not mine. And what if I'm right and at some future date you're rudely wakened from the big sleep all dressed up and no place to go?
For your information, mathematics is neither bloodless, nor dry. To those who espouse it, it is beautiful and elegant. But of course, you are free to stick to whatever popular misconceptions you desire.
I am not claiming that math has no limitations. (Are you responding to me, or somebody else?)
What I am claiming is that any mathematically and properly constructed document would have one and only one interpretation, period. Mathematics is not a perfect language, but it is a universal one. It conveys the same ideas to everybody, no matter what the native tongue: 2+2=4, no matter what culture you are from. And a mathematical document doesn't need to use calculus or analytic geometry to convey its point; it can use nothing more than mere Boolean logic to make its meaning unambiguous.
Concerning emotional appeal:
You can still make it happen through a mathematically constructed argument. Besides, if God really did put a Diamond Mountain of Divine Truth on Earth, he wouldn't need to do any further convincing or swaying. Everybody would absolutely believe in his existence, and take every last comma of his word seriously.
If God needs someone to argue with, he shouldn't have cast Satan from heaven. And he shouldn't be barring heretics from heaven either. That, by the way, would include me and my kind.
<hr>
Now, what was that about "hefty dollop of arrogance"??!!
You aren't appealing to authority, or the opinion of the majority, to make your point -- are you?! Because if your are, you ought to believe that the Earth is flat -- since a whole lot more people used to believe that, than the entire global populations of the last few centuries.
<hr>
And aren't you the divinely-sanctioned authority on what God wants or needs!!! Man, if you think *I* presume too much, you've got another thing coming!
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I am; therefore I think.
[This message has been edited by Boris (edited June 24, 1999).]
What kind of foolish notion is it that the majority is always right ? If that is true then you can have no objection to slavery because everyone used to think that was a god-given social situation, some people were just born slave and that was their destiny.
Same thing for royal absolutism, pleas abolish all democratic governments and reinstate all the old kings in their full glory.
Don't you see there is a shift occuring in the last two centuries in society ? Especially this very medium, the internet is catalysing this change. In stead of a verticle alignment, man to god, we get a horizontal alignment, man to man. We can communicate with each and every one on the planet, this increases our understanding of one another and decreases the suspicion between individuals and people. God as an authoritif figure is more and more losing it's meaning, hence the succes of all the boeddist derivates like New Age and alike. If christianity is going to survive in the coming centuries, it will have to change as well or it will be replaced by an other religion. Take for example the katholic church, they will have to become more democratic and feminise (this means becoming more horizontal) because their rigid stucture is the most vulnarable. Hopefully the next pope will understand this, otherwise the future looks very grim indeed for the katholics. The protestants like most of you Americans are are already very split up into small fractions each having their own interpretation of the bible this might seem more democratic but the need to fall back on a book with all the answers is still to much of a dogma. This is something the katholics managed to overcome because of their rigid and autoritif structure the bible became less important, it was the pope who had the final saying in matters of belief. That is why the katholics don't have a big problem with modern bible critique and even encourage it.
For example it was shown that the book of Daniel was actually a fraud ! Daniel pretented to live during the babylonian times in writing this book but actually lived 3 centuries later. This enabled him to make very accurate profecies of the times to come to Nebucadnezar who called for him to explain his dreams. This was found because Daniels account of the babylonian court was very vague indeed but knowledge of the Seleucidian empire was very accurate. The katholics know this but simply say that the text itself still has a purpose as it shows how the apocaliptic style was develloped. Besides it is old testament and for christians the real thing that matters is the new testament because that is was distingueses them from Jews.
You see that the book doesn't has all the anwers, they have to come from within.
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we are midgets standing on the backs of giants,
Plato
I am far from an expert in mathematics, but i feel that the Bible and any other religious book is there for us to read, and pick up hints about things, until science can prove it, or disaprove it.
This is a little off topic, but if you use the mathematics of today to create a child, it would have taken 400 years before conceving it. vs Organic mathematics takes only 9 months.
Do you Christians follow every sentence in the Bible? I just wondered, because according to the bible ( i will look it up again) it is legal to stone your wife if she disobey you...and that is also legal according to Islam...
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Just waiting for my peabrain to boot into English :-p
Yiipee!
Not a junior member anymore :)
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Just waiting for my peabrain to boot into English :-p
Off the subject, congratulations H-kon.
Anyway, What is the possibility of one planet just happening to have life on it, just happening to be perfectly sustainable to our needs, and for so many religions to just pop up and all be so closely related. I do not believe that all of this is just a coincidence. How does KEarth happen to be the only planet, so far, in our universe to have bodies of liquid water large enogh to sustain life. I believe that God spread his word to us(what little of his word that we are capable of understanding) and then it was changed peice by peice by many different cultures. I am not the person to ask on what God thinks, wants, or how He created the earth, but I do believe that
He did , in His own power, create the earth. kI am LChristian because I was born and raised christian and because I agree with what I was taught. Not because I am blind to scientific reasoning. I also believe that in some way God used his infinite knowlege of science to create everything. But I believe that one thing is for sure and in this whole debate of religion it is the one thing that has been left out. If you take all the religions of the world taht worship a good and merciful god-like being, the one main ritual to be practiced by humans is simply love and kindness toward one another.
Quote :
" If you take all the religions of the world taht worship a good and merciful god-like being, the one main ritual to be practiced by humans is simply love and kindness toward one another."
There is an other explantion for this observation : they are all religions of humans so there must be some basic things that are the same in all the human philosophies and religions, it is human nature to want love and kindness even stronger, it is a heritage from our long history and evolution, we were molded like that.
What I'm trying to show is there is always more then one way to look at things and sometimes the truth is what you make of it. Once detached from verifiable facts, any statement becomes meaningless.
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we are midgets standing on the backs of giants,
Plato
You do make some very interesting points, but here is one for you to refute. There once was only one language, but sometime around the time of Babel they suddenly become many.
Also what proof do YOU have that the book of daniel was not written when it was. There have been interesting theories that it was not, but just as many that there are.
If you really are interested in this perhaps you can go to http://www.yfiles.com. It does make some interesting points.
Also which you can read about and has been confirmed by gene-scientist is that man DID NOT come from apes or monkeys, basic thermodynamic laws that control the universe and entropy go against evolution. No one jumps for joy from radiation mutation because they have just evolved into a higher species.
Also there has been a "common thread" that has been observed throughout the world's religions. Kindness and love, right, evolution, which you may or may not puport to believe, is survival of the fittest not the kindest and most loving. Alpha males and females, ie dominance, is however in genetic coding, and even complete HUMAN strangers will emulate this behavior if put into a closed system.
I personally don't care if it was or wasn't the big bang, there are far more important things in my life to consider. I suppose though we could just post a discussion on different ways to effectively promote bio-terrorism because we would all "learn" something.
This is not meant to be a slam, but even darwin predicted that humanism or man becomes his own god would prevail if any took his own THEORIES seriously.
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Beyond Logic ... Faith Begins
There once was only one language, but sometime around the time of Babel they suddenly become many.
Hooyey. There are several major language families in the world, and all of them are more anscient than the oldest legends of the Bible. One also has to point out that all the human languages share the same fundamental lexical structure (hinting at an evolutionary origin and certain constraints stemming from brain mechanics).
Also which you can read about and has been confirmed by gene-scientist is that man DID NOT come from apes or monkeys, basic thermodynamic laws that control the universe and entropy go against evolution. No one jumps for joy from radiation mutation because they have just evolved into a higher species.
I refer you to the Evolution vs. Creation thread; you will find ample response to that particular objection.
But let me add that evolution indeed does not claim that we originate from monkeys or any of the modern apes. The other primate species we see today have also evolved in parallel to us; our common ancestor(s) is (are) gone extinct.
Also there has been a "common thread" that has been observed throughout the world's religions. Kindness and love, right, evolution, which you may or may not puport to believe, is survival of the fittest not the kindest and most loving. Alpha males and females, ie dominance, is however in genetic coding, and even complete HUMAN strangers will emulate this behavior if put into a closed system.
Once again, browse the Evolution vs. Creation thread.
This is not meant to be a slam, but even darwin predicted that humanism or man becomes his own god would prevail if any took his own THEORIES seriously.
Those are a bit more than just THEORIES now. We've not only got actual evidence of evolution occurring even now, we've done a few better and discovered the very mechanism behind genes and recombination thereof. Not to mention the ever-expanding fossil record or the painfully obvious morphological, behavioral and biochemical evidence. I've cited quite a few examples in the Evolution vs. Creation thread, but here's a sample: why do we have five totally useless fingers on each foot? why do we have a remnant of a tail at the end of our spinal columns? why are our bodies still covered with useless hair? why do we share 98-99% of our genes with chimpanzees? why are we 70% water? why do we bear so much in common to other mammals?
I think by now evolution has become an undeniable fact -- kind of like the fact that the Sun rises every morning. Disputing such things is becoming an increasingly ridiculous undertaking.
Which brings us to the significance of the Big Bang. If one assumes the governance of the universe by physical laws (and therefore no divine intervention), then we can trace our origins precisely to the event that seems to be the origin of our universe. By building an accurate picture of the universe's origins, we construct an accurate picture of our own origins. And that is significant enough to bother considering.
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I am; therefore I think.
Has evolution become a fact?
One thing has always seemed odd to me . Why has only one species reached the mental capacities that the humans have ? We are by no means the oldest species
( maybe you covered this in the evolution thread ? )
Great question!
Actually, there is hot debate going on right now concerning the particular evolutionary pressures that had lead to the stunning growth of the brain in primates. I do not possess an answer to your question as of now.
But we can speculate, nevertheless. One of the most obvious things about primates is how poorly adapted we are. We are pretty weak, we don't have big claws or a huge mouth filled with tusks. So perhaps the growing brain was a way to survive such mal-adaptations by compensating with smarts for what our ancestors lacked in brawn. There are also ideas floating about that suggest our tree-dwelling ancestors were forced to forage on foot around ever-growing territories as climate changed and the forests died off. A large brain would have helped to formulate optimal foraging strategies, as well as memorize the landscape in detail. There are other hypotheses too.
But you've got to keep something else in mind. While as a species we are pretty young, as a biological mechanism we are among the oldest. When the dinosaurs died, the mammals lived on. That suggests that we mammals sport better, more advanced design. And Homo Sapiens is among the latest mammal species to emerge -- so on the ladder of life, we indeed would be the prime candidates for sophistication.
Then, there's a certain degree of uncertainty in claiming that we are the first to achieve this level of sophistication. It could well be that another species on Earth used to be at our level a few million years ago, and since then erosion and glaciers wiped the traces of that advanced civilization off the face of the planet. There is even less certainty in the assumption that we are the last Earth-based species to obtain this level of intelligence. You never know -- in another 100 million years, we might have ultra-smart terrestrial octopuses roaming around. Or maybe, the Earth will be utterly annihilated in the course of some innocent school science project ;)
But to this day, it is not at all clear that emergence of higher intelligence is an inevitable consequence of life. In fact, while the universe may be teaming with life, our species could well turn out to be rather unique in our mental abilities. We could very well be a rare cosmic accident. But, on the other hand, one does observe increasing sophistication throughout the course of natural history, with ever larger and more complex life-forms emerging. So perhaps the genesis of intelligence is a lot more inevitable than we may think. Only one thing's for sure -- at least at present, we seem to be the only species on Earth who can call itself sentient.
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I am; therefore I think.
To Boris, I simply have to say, if evolution has become an undeniable fact, then why do so many highly informed people deny it?
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I'm really not a shorty.
Uhm... Let's see...
Could it be that they are not as "highly informed" as they proclaim themselves to be??
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I am; therefore I think.
Boris
Quote
---- And Homo Sapiens is among the latest mammal species to emerge -- so on the
ladder of life, we indeed would be the prime candidates for sophistication.
this may be true but it would be easier for me to follow if there was some link between Homo Erectus & earlier primates. Even the timespan in between is quite short for evolution to account for the amount of changes seen.
Evolution fits before and after this point (at least in my mind) but I always get stuck on this apparent skip of 1 or 2 billion years ?
Heres one for you guys and gals to think
about: IF God can do anything why can't he make a rock so big that even he could not pick up? I think we have a problem to address here.
The Australopithecus africanus lived between 4,000,000 B.P. and was by 2,300,000 B.P. a tool user.
Homo habilis lived between 2.4 and 1.5 million years ago in Africa, he was the first hominid.
If you look at it this way there is no missing link...
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"If I have been able to see further, it was only because I stood on the shoulders of giants."
Isaac Newton
Hi Boris,
How about this to add to your "brain debate"...the idea that aliens are the missing link? The Bible says that the elohim were involved in our creation. Some think that this relates to science in the form of genetics. Have you ever noticed how big an aliens head is? What if the ape-man was genetically altered by angels, in response to God's command? I've heard interpretations of Genesis lately that have blown my mind, but as well, make a lot of sense compared to the literal creation story that you guys think is so silly. Satan was a snake? Do you really believe that? Satan was a geneticist, and he had sex with eve. That was the fall.
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God loves you and so do I!
Lori,
Did you miss that post Plato just made right before you?
And yes, there are some truly astonishing 'interpretations' of the Bible floating around these days (and not just of the Bible, either.) It's amazing to see how sickeningly people twitch when their religion is backed into a corner.
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I am; therefore I think.
Plato
Seems I did not have all the facts . Maybe next time I should search BEFORE I type.
Thanks
god,
don't mention it.
If you want a nice link to the Australopithecus try this one (http://www.pro-am.com/origins/research/austgen1.htm) or even this one (http://www.academicpress.com/jhevol), with a very good article in pdf format
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"If I have been able to see further, it was only because I stood on the shoulders of giants."
Isaac Newton
[This message has been edited by Plato (edited September 14, 1999).]
truestory
09-14-99, 06:35 PM
I have often thought that if I were one who was not sure, I would err on the side of God. Afterall, how can not believing in the big bang hurt you? You will not be judged by the big bang!
truestory,
I'm sorry but that is just plain opportunistic cowardness. Not my cup of tea at all !
Evolution or Darwinian concepts, state that a living organism will evolve to it's habitat. When an animal has evolved to a specific geographical areas climate and food supplies then the natural need to evolve no longer exists. Climatic changes induce the need evolve or adapt some more, hence why the evolution of species is not linear, and some haven't changed for millions of years i.e. Crocodiles. We have as a species have evolved, but now I believe that evolutionary road for our species is at an end, simply because we no longer need to adapt to new enviroments, we adapt our surroundings to suit ourselfs.
Without Darwinian evolution life could not exist, life couldn't adapt to climatic change and would therefor die. Creationist"and the earth is only 6000 years old" thinking is in contradiction to this which is a good reason why I'm not religeous.
As for the missing link, we don't even have a complete catalogue of everything that is alive on this rock yet, so why be surprised when we don't know what happened 2,000,000 years ago.
truestory
09-16-99, 05:10 PM
Dear Plato,
As usual, you are right. It is very brave to go up against God. Unwise, but brave!
(All of the fallen angels can confirm this).
In your opinion, are the Big Bang Theory and God mutually exclusive?
truestory,
No I don't think the big bang and god are mutually exclusive. The fact that you even bring this up merly shows the growing misunderstanding in that science and religion are two forces opposing each other. Most of the discussions on this board somehow take this assumption for granted but this is not true at all !
What is true is that the scientific method, which says look at the universe first before you make theories, is directly opposed to the fundamentalistic view of taking the creation myths as they are recorded in the holy books or as they are passed oraly from generation to generation.
For any religion it is a maturing catarsys if it can rid itself from its own myths and dares to face the universe as it is. You see, religions aren't based on myths but on the fundamental existential questions. These questions will be for ever out of reach of science because science only addresses measurable variables.
I hope this kind of puts things back in their perspective.
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"If I have been able to see further, it was only because I stood on the shoulders of giants."
Isaac Newton
truestory
09-17-99, 12:41 PM
Thanks, Plato
Now I understand where you are coming from.
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Have a great day!
Plato, truestory:
I would like to interject that there is no clear-cut relationship between God and science. It is true that they are not directly opposed to one another. However, it is also true that they cannot co-exist harmoniously. Science seeks to explain in most excruciating detail everything that was, is, or will be -- through purely physical processes. In essence, it seeks to eliminate God from the on-going evolution of the universe. As scientific theories expand their spacial and temporal range, they tend to push God farther and farther out of our vicinity and back into the past. Science, by its very nature, continually encroaches on the domains of existence previously reserved for the supernatural or divine. And, as Plato alluded, in its path it tends to destroy the old myths that have been so dear, and provided so much security, to so many.
Science and religion cannot coexist in peace, and it's mostly the fault of science. Science can only live in peace with mystery and the premise of the unknown -- but not with any descriptive theories stemming from religious sources. A postulated existence of an epistemological limit to comprehension is the only point on which science and religion can possibly touch base.
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I am; therefore I think.
[This message has been edited by Boris (edited September 17, 1999).]
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