Thread: Is it possible for us as men to have a discussion on God

Originally Posted by Jimbo

Apologies, I did not mean to impugn the peer review process. I just wanted to point out that peer review is simply internal validation, whether it be related to scientific discourse or any other discourse.

I am sure the ancient texts of all religions have been poured over throughout the ages by countless men and women learned in their respective theologies. I do not believe peer review is unique to science.

James.

I'm not sure about your specifics but it sounds like your talking about the process of submitting for publication, which is not peer-review. Peer review is after it gets published and your peers read it and agree, try to duplicate your experiment and get the same results or experiment and refute your results.

As for peers being other scientist well yes they are peers that have the ability to test your hypothesis to either con firm or deny it. I don't think it would mean much if the former crack addict on the corner who failed out of grade seven reviewed the scientific work, but then again he could start his own church and someone would follow.

Being judged by peers is good enough when you want to send someone away or fry them in the chair.

Originally Posted by JMS

1) holy books stand as a witness, not necessarily proof!

2) The people who wrote those books are just that, people who are fallible, as are scientists, by the way!

1) I made that point in my post. They are used as supporting evidence (as is a witness) when the words happen to mirror some personal experience. But then when the words are shown to support bad religious practices/conventions, they are somehow lacking that same direct connection to God. It's cherry picking, at best.

2) Scientists have never claimed to be infallible, I don't understand why you made that comment. And no person who legitimately understands science has ever claimed that it's practitioners or resultant ideas are anything more than contingently accurate; better investigative tools and compounded knowledge may always revise scientific theories. But the words in holy books are frequently believed to be infallible (look at Kent Hovind, et al.) by believers, even though you may not view them that way.

Originally Posted by jnich67

I think it can be done, but such a huge subject would need to be narrowed I think. How about this. How are you all defining "God"? As a conscious "being" actively involved the lives of humans or as something more representative of life and nature as a whole- more "impersonal" if you will?

Jordan

When your talking about the supreme being your talking about the unlimited meaning you could not limit to just being a being or just being an impersonal energy that binds, your really talking about an infinite thing that combines all things into a supreme thing which would include all matter and all consciousness also. So hence we would be part of god but cut from the same cloth.

For instance I think that consciousness is this supreme element that is made up of all stuff rolled into one, pure potential, and we are that consciousness as that is what our souls is made of, us not being the mind or body but being our consciousness(spirit).
God being the embodiment of that consciousness and everyting being part of that. I mean the idea that an impersonal energy takes precedence over a lving energy like consciousness is weird right?
I mean if was a game of lets guess which is better, you could put any non-living impersonal energy in front of me and i would always choose the living thing as better and so it should being better hold a higher more central place in the construction/creation of existance.
And wherever you find life you find consciousness, all living things house souls, even the animals and plants and bacteria, whatever form a soul deserves is the form it will get.
Souls/consciousness/spirits are the only constant things around here that are eternal around here, everything else is temporary and changes with time around the souls.

*My 2 Cents...

Best regards
Greg

Honestly I do not have the time to read the 31 pages from this thread so I will throw out my thoughts.

I am a logician by trade. I tend to think in logical patterns.

That being said, I can say this.

Descartes started the talk by saying that, in general, that he thinks therefor he is. What he was saying is that all his other senses could be fooled and therefore not trusted, but that thoughts were his own and if they were not, say a bad thought crept in there. Well a good being would not have put it there so if there is a bad being then there must by definition be a good being. Simplified argument, please don't pick apart the nuance.

There is also the argument of infinite regress that states that if there is an ultimate being, then he must have been created by some more powerful being, and so on, and so on.

Hobbes said that life out side of society was cold, brutish, and short. In his time religion was as much a part of society as peanuts are to baseball.

Kant was a religious man, and gave it up after he realized that there were other answers to be found.

Marx stated that religion was the opiate of the masses, which I believe in my gut is truth.

Myself, I look at it like this. I start my argument from a creationist standpoint. If, insert divine being here, created the world and man/women. If this being created 1 man and 1 women, to which many children were born, then in how many generations would it take before people started to die off from in breeding and genetic mutations?

Surely this cannot be the case.

Equally I take issue with evolution. I think evolution is too neat a theory. Some cosmic ooze that was struck by lightning and bingo 1 million years later here we are dragging our knuckles and making fire. To me this is a broad brush statement that leaves to many holes to fill.

I do not believe that we were deposited here by aliens. I do not believe that we are in some Matrixesqe, brain in a vat world.

God or your divine being (by Divine being I mean one that has not walked the earth, Buddha, Mouhammed, Jesus Christ, and others have walked the earth) is a societal creation to combat superstition. Pure and simple. When we do not understand or lose our ability to cope with a situation then we seek out solace in the divine. Some are devout and I do not begrudge them at all.

I guess I look to myself for answers that I do to others. I do believe in Karma and that what you put out, good or bad, comes back 3 fold to you. Oddly enough this philosophy has been around longer that most mainstream religions and in the Christian faith it is known as do unto others as you would have done to you.

I have always said that mainstream religion was nothing more that a simplification of other "pagen" polytheistic religions. Most of these "pagen" religions had a god for most everything under the sun. Main stream religion comes along, consolidates this into one person and prayer one day a week and now it is easier to please "god" because he is one person and not many.

I guess inside of this ramble all tied up I can say that God is a farce dreamed up by a cast of bishops and others to keep people in line and subjugate those that would not fall in line. It was a dream to help people and a reason to spill blood through the centuries.

Originally Posted by JMS

people who are fallible, as are scientists, by the way!

a small anecdote told by Dawkins:
"I do remember one formative influence in my undergraduate life. There was an elderly professor in my department who had been passionately keen on a particular theory for, oh, a number of years, and one day an American visiting researcher came and he completely and utterly disproved our old man's hypothesis. The old man strode to the front, shook his hand and said, "My dear fellow, I wish to thank you, I have been wrong these fifteen years". And we all clapped our hands raw. That was the scientific ideal, of somebody who had a lot invested, a lifetime almost invested in a theory, and he was rejoicing that he had been shown wrong and that scientific truth had been advanced."

THAT is the difference between a scientist and a priest. where as the priest may cry herecy or blasphemy the scientist will learn. even as a child, I was always in trouble for asking questions in church. "it's not right to question, you must have faith," etc etc.

science admits its fallibility, celebrates it, and uses it as a drive to improve itself. science hasn't ever burned someone at the stake for having an opposing opinion.

You just can't keep a good thread down!
Jockeys, if you keep talking that way...well. lets just say I know some people who know some people...if you get my meaning.

Originally Posted by JMS

You just can't keep a good thread down!
Jockeys, if you keep talking that way...well. lets just say I know some people who know some people...if you get my meaning.

Not when people keep linking to it from other threads

Originally Posted by jockeys

science admits its fallibility, celebrates it, and uses it as a drive to improve itself. science hasn't ever burned someone at the stake for having an opposing opinion.

Show me the scientific community that will consider the possibility of intelligent design with out crucifying the proponent of the theory. See the movie Expelled. I would counter that "Science" is the opiate of the "educated", used to justify their humanistic desires without being accountable to a higher moral standard.

Matt

Originally Posted by mhailey

Show me the scientific community that will consider the possibility of intelligent design with out crucifying the proponent of the theory. See the movie Expelled. I would counter that "Science" is the opiate of the "educated", used to justify their humanistic desires without being accountable to a higher moral standard.

Matt

Intelligent Design requires a Designer. a Designer is, a priori, unknowable. you cannot use science, ever, to address the existence or non-existence of deities. all talk of a Designer belongs in a philosophy class, because there is no way to evaluate that idea with the scientific method.

to put it bluntly, Intelligent Design is inherently unscientific. it's a philosophy. and yes, scientists frequently ignore philosophers, but only because they are playing a different game. it'd be like convincing John MacEnroe to play basketball with Micheal Jordan.

Having been raised by charismatic Penticosts, i am encouraged that religious organizations are opening up to the notion of an "Intelligent Design."...its a step in the right direction; considering all the science out there.
I am however, waiting patiently for there to actually be some 'intelligence' in said notion. Hopefully, "Intelligent Design," is still a work in progress???