If computers, cars, etc. have designers why not the universe?

[Saint Nick]

What's the champagne?

Earth. *head explodes*

 

[lxskllr]

What's the champagne?

Unknown. It might be a meta "universe", where that glob of "stuff" is a part of an even greater glob of "stuff".

 

[pelov]

Unknown. It might be a meta "universe", where that glob of "stuff" is a part of an even greater glob of "stuff".

See? My Human Centipede analogy works quite well. If we're to consider the conservation of energy (shut the fuck up, you dirty quantum physicists) that means the cudderrrfish and vanirra paste are being endlessly chewed and digested in a circular weaving of gods, all attached ass-to-mouth.

 

[Braznor]

I don't need a reason. That is the flaw in your argument. What has been offered without evidence can likewise be dismissed without evidence.

Of course, you don't need a reason to be so wrong in all this. I already know you sit on an intellectual high horse from where you cannot see ahead of your own nose. You are going about this without knowing the true definition of an axiom.

An axiom is a premise or starting point of reasoning. As classically conceived, an axiom is a premise so evident as to be accepted as true without controversy.[1] The word comes from the Greek ἀξίωμα 'that which is thought worthy or fit,' or 'that which commends itself as evident.'[2][3] As used in modern logic, an axiom is simply a premise or starting point for reasoning.[4] Axioms define and delimit the realm of analysis. In other words, an axiom is a logical statement that is assumed to be true.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Axiom

Axioms aren't mere statements, they are statements which are self evidently true. Axioms are used when you have to start your reasoning at a certain base of logic above which you begin your reasoning. I told you and your friends a hundreds before, don't argue with half baked knowledge. If you are wrong, get over it. If you don't know, shut up or ask questions. But don't try to fit the universe into your theory unless you have a good basis or valid comparison for doing so.

These are not the universe, and we are discussing the universe.

Oh you mean you want to describe the universe and its nature without using maths, physics or logic? The universe is described fundamentally through sets of axioms built over the premise of the existence of the universe. Now you want to break with this tradition of science? How about Jesus Power : deacceleration experienced in direct proportion to stupidity? Good luck trying to debate the universe without maths, physics or at the very least logic.

Blah blah blah. I repeat myself again, thusly and like so...

Again, you show your attitude towards knowledge. You couldn't get something as simple as an axiom right. Then you used the Completeness theorem in the complete wrong sense without understanding anything in it and now you dismiss the points I made as Blah, Blah, Blah. Real mature debating there.

Repeating yourself is not a virtue when the point you make is at best, confused and at worst, willful ignorance. You yourself said the universe exists as it is i.e a self evident statement of its existence i.e. a way of considering the existence of the universe as true by itself. We accept it so and there the premise of the universe is an axiom by itself, the base order of reasoning contributing to any consistent theory to describe it. When we try to frame models trying to define the universe, it is nothing, but attempt to establish the universe as an axiom, a way of proving it to ourselves that what we see is what actually is and we move on further. Now I don't think you are going to understand the meaning of the point I just made. Don't worry, it wasn't for your benefit, that point was made for the benefit of other people to understand half baked knowledge can be a very dangerous thing.

Axioms are statements in a language. The universe is not a language.


I have offered the only necessary counterpoint, and I have now repeated it four times. You can continue typing these huge word salads all day -- none of them have addressed the simple fact that your arguments apply to math, not the universe.

Again the only thing you offered is a shining glimpse of your ignorance and you have the arrogance to claim that was the only thing necessary. Please grow up and try to debate using the points made or just shut up. I have every right to offer a logical scientific reasoning to my claims here and if you want to contest them, debate the points with reason.

You have half baked knowledge upto the extent of knowing some meaning of axiom without ever realizing the meaning behind it and then you are trying to feed me your flawed logic. Also you want to say my arguments which apply to maths do not apply to the universe? Eh? Where did Maths come from? What is maths used for? How do we describe the world without maths? With pixie dust? Please get off your intellectual high horse and try looking at the ridiculousness of your own arguments. Please do not keep flogging the dead horse that was your flawed half baked point you are pretending to make here. Everyone makes mistakes and I made many too, so just grow up and move on to make yourself better.

 

[momeNt]

Of course, you don't need a reason to be so wrong in all this. I already know you sit on an intellectual high horse from where you cannot see ahead of your own nose. You are going about this without knowing the true definition of an axiom.



Axioms aren't mere statements, they are statements which are self evidently true. Axioms are used when you have to start your reasoning at a certain base of logic above which you begin your reasoning. I told you and your friends a hundreds before, don't argue with half baked knowledge. If you are wrong, get over it. If you don't know, shut up or ask questions. But don't try to fit the universe into your theory unless you have a good basis or valid comparison for doing so.




Oh you mean you want to describe the universe and its nature without using maths, physics or logic? The universe is described fundamentally through sets of axioms built over the premise of the existence of the universe. Now you want to break with this tradition of science? How about Jesus Power : deacceleration experienced in direct proportion to stupidity? Good luck trying to debate the universe without maths, physics or at the very least logic.




Again, you show your attitude towards knowledge. You couldn't get something as simple as an axiom right. Then you used the Completeness theorem in the complete wrong sense without understanding anything in it and now you dismiss the points I made as Blah, Blah, Blah. Real mature debating there.

Repeating yourself is not a virtue when the point you make is at best, confused and at worst, willful ignorance. You yourself said the universe exists as it is i.e a self evident statement of its existence i.e. a way of considering the existence of the universe as true by itself. We accept it so and there the premise of the universe is an axiom by itself, the base order of reasoning contributing to any consistent theory to describe it. When we try to frame models trying to define the universe, it is nothing, but attempt to establish the universe as an axiom, a way of proving it to ourselves that what we see is what actually is and we move on further. Now I don't think you are going to understand the meaning of the point I just made. Don't worry, it wasn't for your benefit, that point was made for the benefit of other people to understand half baked knowledge can be a very dangerous thing.





Again the only thing you offered is a shining glimpse of your ignorance and you have the arrogance to claim that was the only thing necessary. Please grow up and try to debate using the points made or just shut up. I have every right to offer a logical scientific reasoning to my claims here and if you want to contest them, debate the points with reason.

You have half baked knowledge upto the extent of knowing some meaning of axiom without ever realizing the meaning behind it and then you are trying to feed me your flawed logic. Also you want to say my arguments which apply to maths do not apply to the universe? Eh? Where did Maths come from? What is maths used for? How do we describe the world without maths? With pixie dust? Please get off your intellectual high horse and try looking at the ridiculousness of your own arguments. Please do not keep flogging the dead horse that was your flawed half baked point you are pretending to make here. Everyone makes mistakes and I made many too, so just grow up and move on to make yourself better.

If you want to get his reasoning, just look up wikipedia and go to any of your ideas and go to "criticisms", this is the extent of his knowledge, and why he won't debate you with reason, just 1 sentence responses.

 

[Braznor]

Queue the AT atheist circlejerk! Bring out the lotion boys, I've got the biscuit!

Its not even just religion which gets bashed here. Anything which is not in the comfort zone of some people no matter how logical or scientific gets attacked by these same people. There is no base to their arrogance except half baked knowledge of truths men far greater than them discovered. These people have no love for knowledge or science, they just have pride resting on the laurels of other men. They express this pride in terms of bashing anything unfathomable by their own limited reasoning. For these people, science is just a vehicle and tool for their ego trips. They are no better than a man who uses religion to make himself feel superior over other men.

 

[Braznor]

Maybe we should have a philosophy subforum where people can debate contexts of religion and science together without undue criticisms/attacks. Highly Technical can be for pure science. Politics can be Politics and News without debates on religion except in political context.

 

[momeNt]

Maybe we should have a philosophy subforum where people can debate contexts of religion and science together without undue criticisms/attacks. Highly Technical can be for pure science. Politics can be Politics and News without debates on religion except in political context.

You'll have to find a different venue. You'll just be arguing with wikipedia subtopics on AT.

 

[lxskllr]

Maybe we should have a philosophy subforum where people can debate contexts of religion and science together without undue criticisms/attacks. Highly Technical can be for pure science. Politics can be Politics and News without debates on religion except in political context.

Religion can't be debated in a scientific(in the generic sense) forum. It can be argued on philosophical grounds, but as soon as you start trying to "prove" religion, you've lost. It's unprovable, and can't stand in a discussion that requires proof, or at least something that can be observed, tested, and repeated.

 

[Lonbjerg]

Its not even just religion which gets bashed here. Anything which is not in the comfort zone of some people no matter how logical or scientific gets attacked by these same people. There is no base to their arrogance except half baked knowledge of truths men far greater than them discovered. These people have no love for knowledge or science, they just have pride resting on the laurels of other men. They express this pride in terms of bashing anything unfathomable by their own limited reasoning. For these people, science is just a vehicle and tool for their ego trips. They are no better than a man who uses religion to make himself feel superior over other men.

Its not even just religion which gets bashed here. Anything which is not in the comfort zone of some people no matter how logical or scientific gets attacked by these same people. There is no base to their arrogance fancy word games men far greater than them discovered. These people have no love for knowledge or science, they just have pride resting on the laurels of other men. They express this pride in terms of semanctics nitpicking and empty philosophy by their own limited reasoning. For these people, philosophy is just a vehicle and tool for their ego trips. They are no better than a man who uses religion to make himself feel superior over other men.

FYP :whiste:

 

[HardcoreRobot]

I suppose it could, but that's a far cry from assuming it does.

 

[Skyclad1uhm1]

I'll play.

Say you can choose between designing a robot that distributes food among the needy, or one that has a machinegun and goes around shooting random people based on software which allows it to 'decide' who to kill and who not. You design the second and send it into a shopping centre to kill as many people as possible.
Who do you say is responsible for the killing? The robot, which would have never killed anyone if you had not chosen to design it that way, or you for deciding to 'create' something to cause a massacre?

According to the Bible 'God' created everything. That includes evil. And as he's supposed to be omniscient he was fully aware of the implications of how he 'created' everything. That means your god fully knowing created pedophiles, rapists, murderers, torturers, and other scum. He created cancer, AIDS, Ebola and all other diseases and illnesses. He created all disasters, every attrocity, every genocide, every war.

And that's what you worship. You worship someone who could have left out rape from creation. Who could have not created pedophiles. Who could have prevented genocides from ever taking place. But who chose that it's apparently a fun way to pass eternity.
After all, he could create the perfect universe where whatever beings he wanted would not have any flaws. So, looking at what exists now you can safely say that either it was not created by the God of the Bible, or that you worship something infinitely worse than any of the other gods and demons ever thought up.

 

[Sho'Nuff]

Obviously any talk of God in this forum is subject to ridicule. However you have to admit that if houses, automobiles and computers all have designers which are less complex than say DNA, the human brain and molecules. Isn't there a slight possibility that there may be a designer behind those things as well?


Can universal laws come about from chaos?

Can order be birthed from disorder?

The universe is governed by very precise laws, is it possible that it all happened by pure coincidence or chance?

Ah, the grand unanswerable question. My personal viewpoint is that the universe is too complex a system to have evolved from nothing. "Something" set things in motion a long, long time ago, IMO. What that "something" and where "it" came from are equally intriguing and confounding questions. Call it what you will. "God," "Vishnu," "Allah," a supreme being, etc. It doesn't matter to me. But it is pretty hard to accept that such an enormously complex system developed from literally nothing.

"Minute creatures swarm around us... objects of potentially endless study and admiration, if we are willing to sweep our vision down from the world lined by the horizon to include the world an arm's length away. A lifetime can be spent in a Magellanic voyage around the trunk of a tree." E.O. Wilson.

 

[Arkitech]

I'll play.

Say you can choose between designing a robot that distributes food among the needy, or one that has a machinegun and goes around shooting random people based on software which allows it to 'decide' who to kill and who not. You design the second and send it into a shopping centre to kill as many people as possible.
Who do you say is responsible for the killing? The robot, which would have never killed anyone if you had not chosen to design it that way, or you for deciding to 'create' something to cause a massacre?

According to the Bible 'God' created everything. That includes evil. And as he's supposed to be omniscient he was fully aware of the implications of how he 'created' everything. That means your god fully knowing created pedophiles, rapists, murderers, torturers, and other scum. He created cancer, AIDS, Ebola and all other diseases and illnesses. He created all disasters, every attrocity, every genocide, every war.

And that's what you worship. You worship someone who could have left out rape from creation. Who could have not created pedophiles. Who could have prevented genocides from ever taking place. But who chose that it's apparently a fun way to pass eternity.
After all, he could create the perfect universe where whatever beings he wanted would not have any flaws. So, looking at what exists now you can safely say that either it was not created by the God of the Bible, or that you worship something infinitely worse than any of the other gods and demons ever thought up.

“God did not create evil. Just as darkness is the absence of light, evil is the absence of God.”

I think that quote from Einstein is an apt description of why evil is in the world. Cold is the absence of heat, dark the absence of light, evil the absence of love. God created humans (and angels) with the capacity of free will, otherwise we would be robots. Is it fair to blame him because a person(s) with free will decided to use it for bad reasons? If a parent raised a child to the best of his or her ability and as an adult that child became a criminal is it the parent's fault if they did all they could to raise the child correctly?

Also in the bible that issue is addressed, in fact its the theme of bible. Basically the bible's theme is whether or not God has the right to decide what's best for humans. In Genesis and later in Job, Satan challenged God's right to oversee human affairs. He convinced Adam and Eve that God was'nt needed in their lives, that event led to the introduction of sin into the human race. From sin came all the other evils that we are so familiar with. The problem is that if a person has 0 belief in the bible or God everything I just typed is useless. I realize you can't force a person to believe anything he does'nt want to.

 

[Yongsta]

It's funny how for most of human history if you went against religion and tried to use sciene you were ridiculed and now the opposite is true.

I think there is an architect but it's not the God from the Bible or any religion. From star dust to actual life with beings that have intelligence, finding out various answers about the universe. If we as human beings are created from the Universe and can create and ponder things, why can't there be a creator of the Universe? Perhaps in a dimension above, creating a universe is as simple as putting pen to paper is for us.

Also, if there was a being on the other side of the Universe with a brain the size of Jupiter and it had some special abilities (like Q of Star Trek), it wouldn't be God just a rather highly evolved and advanced being.

Regardless, we won't have anything of substance that can come close to answering any of these type of questions in our lifetimes.

 

[AnonymouseUser]

The ultimate question is: What does it matter if there is a creator or not? If one does exist, s/he hasn't made him/herself manifest to anybody, so he/she doesn't care to be acknowledged and doesn't care what we do.

 

[Brigandier]

I think that quote from Einstein is an apt description of why evil is in the world. Cold is the absence of heat, dark the absence of light, evil the absence of love. God created humans (and angels) with the capacity of free will, otherwise we would be robots. Is it fair to blame him because a person(s) with free will decided to use it for bad reasons? If a parent raised a child to the best of his or her ability and as an adult that child became a criminal is it the parent's fault if they did all they could to raise the child correctly?

Also in the bible that issue is addressed, in fact its the theme of bible. Basically the bible's theme is whether or not God has the right to decide what's best for humans. In Genesis and later in Job, Satan challenged God's right to oversee human affairs. He convinced Adam and Eve that God was'nt needed in their lives, that event led to the introduction of sin into the human race. From sin came all the other evils that we are so familiar with. The problem is that if a person has 0 belief in the bible or God everything I just typed is useless. I realize you can't force a person to believe anything he does'nt want to.

That's a good way to explain the complexities of consciousness to a child.

 

[preslove]

Things that are designed, like computers and cars, look very different than living organisms and the universe.

 

[Arkitech]

That's a good way to explain the complexities of consciousness to a child.

Well like I said before if you're a person who does'nt believe in the bible then that explanation means nothing. Also just to make it clear, that's not my explanation its from the bible.

 

[Brigandier]

Well like I said before if you're a person who does'nt believe in the bible then that explanation means nothing. Also just to make it clear, that's not my explanation its from the bible.

Sure I believe it, I believe it's a way to explain the world to children, both literal children and intellectual children. Being that, it uses a lot of mumbo-jumbo to gloss over complex details and offer answers to questions with no simple answer, "God did it."

 

[Skyclad1uhm1]

I think that quote from Einstein is an apt description of why evil is in the world. Cold is the absence of heat, dark the absence of light, evil the absence of love. God created humans (and angels) with the capacity of free will, otherwise we would be robots. Is it fair to blame him because a person(s) with free will decided to use it for bad reasons? If a parent raised a child to the best of his or her ability and as an adult that child became a criminal is it the parent's fault if they did all they could to raise the child correctly?

Also in the bible that issue is addressed, in fact its the theme of bible. Basically the bible's theme is whether or not God has the right to decide what's best for humans. In Genesis and later in Job, Satan challenged God's right to oversee human affairs. He convinced Adam and Eve that God was'nt needed in their lives, that event led to the introduction of sin into the human race. From sin came all the other evils that we are so familiar with. The problem is that if a person has 0 belief in the bible or God everything I just typed is useless. I realize you can't force a person to believe anything he does'nt want to.

So is what decisions you make with your 'free will' according to you totally independent of your environment, your upbringing, your thoughts?
Do you believe 'God' is omniscient and omnipotent?
You can program a computer to be able to nuke a country, base it on a random generator and then claim it has 'free will' as 'it never has to reach the value that causes it to launch the nukes'. But you still programmed it, and if it does go wrong you were still the one who set it up to do so.
If God is omniscient then he knew everything his actions and decisions would cause, and he fully aware created pedophiles and caused them to molest children.

For many people 'evil' isn't the absence of some higher power, it's a way to do horrible things and then claim you aren't responsible for what happened, that it was some 'evil power' forcing them.

 

[Arkitech]

Sure I believe it, I believe it's a way to explain the world to children, both literal children and intellectual children. Being that, it uses a lot of mumbo-jumbo to gloss over complex details and offer answers to questions with no simple answer, "God did it."

A lot of people believe the same thing you do. But keep in mind if the bible was just a book of childish like information for simple minded folk why would it have the history that it does? The bible has been around for centuries, it has been translated into almost every known language spoken by man. People have died to ensure that the common man could have a copy of the bible if so desired. Today it is the mostly widely distributed book on the face of the planet. Even though there a growing number of critics of the bible, there are billions of people who still have respect for it.

I find that the people who are most critical of the bible tend to have the least amount of knowledge about what it contains. There is a lot of sound and logical advice in the bible that people even today still follow. When people get past the fact that bible does'nt require people to follow the ancient laws assigned to the nation of Israel then there is a lot of fascinating and helpful information within the book.

 

[Brigandier]

A lot of people believe the same thing you do. But keep in mind if the bible was just a book of childish like information for simple minded folk why would it have the history that it does? The bible has been around for centuries, it has been translated into almost every known language spoken by man. People have died to ensure that the common man could have a copy of the bible if so desired. Today it is the mostly widely distributed book on the face of the planet. Even though there a growing number of critics of the bible, there are billions of people who still have respect for it.

I find that the people who are most critical of the bible tend to have the least amount of knowledge about what it contains. There is a lot of sound and logical advice in the bible that people even today still follow. When people get past the fact that bible does'nt require people to follow the ancient laws assigned to the nation of Israel then there is a lot of fascinating and helpful information within the book.

Ever hear of tall tales? Stories with real information to make them seem plausible. Just because something contains real, verifiable information doesn't make everything contained within it true.

The Bible is just one holy book out of many, what makes you so sure it is the correct one?

 

[moonbogg]

The right questions to ask never occur to humans because we aren't intelligent enough yet. Just like the question of "why" never occurs to a chimp. Humans ask "why" but what is it that we aren't asking ourselves?

 

[Brigandier]

The right questions to ask never occur to humans because we aren't intelligent enough yet. Just like the question of "why" never occurs to a chimp. Humans ask "why" but what is it that we aren't asking ourselves?

"The history of every major Galactic Civilization tends to pass through three distinct and recognizable phases, those of Survival, Inquiry and Sophistication, otherwise known as the How, Why and Where phases.
For instance, the first phase is characterized by the question 'How can we eat?' the second by the question 'Why do we eat?' and the third by the question 'Where shall we have lunch?'" -Douglas Adams