and my personal favourite: http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/americas/bush-god-told-me-to-invade-iraq-509925.html
there are some unnecessarily long-winded explanations on this thread. science, just like no one else, can ever answer the big question, "why" but only "how." only observable phenomenon is explained according to the laws we are aware of. atheism is not wish fulfillment because it never supposes that it knows the 'why'. theism is wish fulfillment because it does exactly that; god must be the guiding hand. still, it's not a very good answer or really reveals anything with that general idea which is basically it (god) decided it should be this way. we don't know why anything is this way or why we are here or why the universe is this way ad nauseum.
The first part depends on what you would define/mean as consciousness. If you mean "life" then there are estimates taken from the fossil records etc. If you mean something else then it would depend on that definition etc. Is it necessarily in the interest? No. But it happened. Will it occur again? Possibly it is occuring all the time on Earth but is undetected, and because of the pervasiveness of existing life it doesn't get a chance to gain a foothold. Will it occur in the future on another planet? Possibly. But why do you feel that their existence is dependent upon you believing they exist? Yet everything you say points to your usage of "exist" requiring consciousness. To use the term as you do therefore has that a priori assumption. [quote[My point was that you have to understand that it exist, or it can exist. It doesn't matter whether it actually exists or not. "Understand" is the key word here. We can argue whether or not God exists, but we must understand what it means to exist, to some degree or other.[/quote]I am lost as to your point here, Jan. You start discussing about existence and the necessity for consciousness for something to exist, and now say that it doesn't matter whether it actually exists or not???? Yet it will still die if shot, and will still kill if it shoots someone else... all without understanding. Again, I think this is because, for whatever reason, you have an a priori assumption of consciousness in your usage/understanding of the term "exist". If I'm wrong then I do apologise but your language seems to lead to this conclusion.
Judging a genre by its worst example works by bypassing the criteria that establishes an issue or personality as either valid or invalid ... and you are doing a remarkable job of it at the moment. :shrug: By your logic, there is no sense in charging a solider with murdering their next door neighbor provided that they have already killed others in the service of their country.
Sarkus, Come on Sarkus, you know what I mean by consciousness. awareness of surroundings: the state of being awake and aware of what is going on around you Then what is the meaning of "evolutionary self-preservation"? Can rock become conscious given enough time? I neither said nor implied that. Maybe you should read it again. No it doesn't.If every unit of consciousness is irradicated, then existence becomes irrelevant. Is there a difference between that and non-existence. Read above. The bullet is the result of consciousness, so if all consciousness was at the level of the childs would the bullet then exist? If there was no consciousness at all, then what would exist? Hopefully this post will give more clarity. jan.
Utter horse puckey. I guess you didn't bother clicking the link, and counting how many people cite God as their inspiration to kill? I put it to you that Sutcliffe wasn't the 'worst' example at all, but merely one of the thousands of such examples. It's rife. Nope, that's tangential and a rather poor analogy. In fact, it's so off the mark I now understand why you are so confused, you do not seem to understand the issue at all.
You would be amazed by what people could mean that I felt it did need clarifying. And unfortunately your definition includes machines with sensors... which some would say is what the majority of animal and plant life actually is. Evolution relates, in this regard, to conscious matter. Not to the inanimate. Inanimate objects have no regard for self-preservation. (One could still see "evolution" in such things as the landscape itself, however.) So, as I said, it is not necessarily in the interest of inanimate matter to develop consciousness - but it happened. How it happened, though... no idea. No. However the chemicals / molecules in the rock might, given the right conditions, possibly break down and mingle/react with other chemicals and molecules and, possibly, some of those new molecules, after a billion years of continually changing environments, could possibly create a molecule that eventually develops consciousness. Apologies - I am trying to decipher exactly what you are saying given that you seem to be saying two things at the same time... one that there is no existence without consciousness, as established from: And then you begin going on about how it is "understanding" existence that is important... which you seem to clarify with your next comment: So you have jumped from "no consciousness = no existence" to "no consciousness = existence is irrelevant". Is there a difference - very much so: Non-existence has no potential. Irrelevant existence has potential to become relevant. When we have no knowledge of something we should certainly treat it logically consistent with something that does not exist... in that regard they are the same. But they are not entirely the same. Okay - change the bullet for a rock falling off a cliff - and let's use an adult rather than a child (to avoid discussions of "levels" of consciousness - which I disagree with). The rock crushes the helpless person before they even becomes aware of it. Does the rock exist or not - because according to your line of argument it doesn't. And if the rock does not exist - how did it kill the person?
Sarkus, Why isn't all matter either concsious, or not concsious? If you've no idea how it happened how do you know your analasys is correct? What is the development process? There are 2 ways of looking at it. Does a falling tree make a sound if there is no being to hear it? The answer is either no it doesn't, or if it does, it is irrelevant, either way it makes no difference. How do you know it has? Bearing in mind that the "no knowledge of something" means complete unawareness of that thing, and the "something that does not exist" is also complete unawareness of that thing. How are they not entirely the same? The rock does exist for as long as there is conscioiusness to acknowledge it's existence. The question you should probably be asking is, does the the rock exist to the the person who it crushed now they are devoid of consciousness. jan.
I guess you can't fathom how a solider engaged in the service of their country on the war front and a solider involved in a homicide case involving their next door neighbor are engaged in the same act. Lets try again more slowly Remove the criteria that distinguishes an act of murder from the job description of a solider and there is no reasonable explanation why a decorated solider should be charged with murder if he kills his next door neighbor. Similarly, remove the criteria that distinguishes an act performed in the service of god and there is no reasonable explanation why the acts of Mr Sutcliffe are any different from what is presented in the bhagavad gita. In short, judging a genre by its worst example is sufficient to grant any world view a vantage point behind shit stained glasses. Please Register or Log in to view the hidden image!
Forgive me if I was wrong to start a thread and disappear. I have spent a lot of time in long debates with atheists and others on different forums, and found too mch debating is not helpful - but I do like to make a comment once in while. I plan to get back into this thread in the next couple of days.
You have yet to satisfactorily define "consciousness", given that your previous definition included artificial sensory machines, robots etc. I don't know it is correct - but it is rational given the available evidence. No idea - I would suggest you look up "abiogenesis". No difference to you. But the analogy is limited in that it does not account for the potential for relevancy that inanimate matter has (rationally speaking). It is the rational conclusion. Something of which there is "no knowledge" still has the potential to become "known". Something which does not exist has no potential to become "known". And you still don't see how your usage of "existence" has an a priori requirement for consciousness? :shrug: I am not concerned if the rock existed for the unfortunate crushed person - but whether it existed at all given that the person who it crushed was not aware of it... was "unaware of it"... "had no knowledge of it".
First point, Darwinism is as you point out a very limited explanation that leaves a lot unanswered. Second point, Occam's razor is not a scientific proof. Also, saying that it might have occurred without a guiding hand does not prove there was no such hand. There are no plausible explanations for the origin of life from matter, only guesses and speculations, certainly not evidence. You provide arguments and reasoning, not evidence - and of course there is no evidence to prove evolution was not guided by God.
If you can describe how things happen using the science of chemistry and physics, topping it off with the statement that God makes all that possible is extraneous. A big if. Chemistry and physics cannot explain how the universe originated or how life originated. Adding God does not dumb down the greateness at all. The scientific facts and laws are still intricate and amazing, space is just as vast. Adding god gives an extra dimension and an extra glory. Your cold dead and lifeless universe is missing something. It is less, not greater. You misunderstand atheism then. Because this doesn't make any sense for non-believers who spent years trying to look for answers from God. They didn't want to not believe, they just couldn't anymore. I mean, you can pretend to believe, but really you either do or you don't. I accept that people become atheists for different reasons - so it is not only wish fulfilment, but also defeatism, apathy, and despair.
You have no scientific proof for your first statement. I don't have any for mine either, but I accept that there are things beyond scientific proof and don't base everything on science. How do you know God is not doing a good job of sustaining the universe? He gives us some freedom, and that includes freedom to mess up. Would you like a world where you were forbidden to do anything except what God allowed?
What is rationally acceptable is highly subjective. That God created matter and scientific laws and got the whole thing started does not conflict with any known scientific evidence or law. That may be often true, but there is no reason that more complex explanations might not sometimes be true as well. You present a rule of thuimb, not scientific proof or law. Who says it is redundant? How do you explain the origins of life and of human consciousness from inert matter? What about form and order in the universes? There is no explanation for these that makes God redundant. Right, no scientific evidence can disporve it. It is beyond science and science is very limited. No, I don't believe in them. They have given me no reason to believe they exist, but God has given me many reasons to believe he exists. Do they communicate with us? No, but God does communicate with us.
So, you have no evidence, as I said. Logic is not scientific evidence. It is not enough just to question the premisses. If I used a syllogism to prove the existence of God, which I didn't, merely questioning the premisses would not in and of itself be a refutation.
There is evidence that supports the notion that a guiding hand was not needed for the origin of species. Darwinism explains how, without any external agent, the species come about, simply because some of them die and some of them live, depending on their fitness (simplified). All scientific theories are by their very nature limited in scope, they don't explain everything, and yet it is one of the most well supported and successful theories in the history of science. It is not necessary that Darwinism disprove that God was involved, only to show that naturalistic forces are the only ones that need to be involved. There are several plausible naturalistic explanations for the origins of life, some of which with supporting evidence. Here is one. These would have to be disproved before it would be logical to consider any supernatural explanation. Nothing supernatural has yet been shown to exist, so it's a rather extraordinary idea. That which is asserted without evidence can also be dismissed without evidence. What is the evidence?
