God & Existence
I've always wondered about existence and God. Theists claim God exists, but they make it a point to state that God's immaterial/nonphysical.
Some possibilities relevant to the issue:
1. Existence & Detection (sensorily, instrumentally, etc.)
(i) X is detectable then X exists (Rejected because of hallucinations)
(ii) X exists then X is detectable (Ok, can be used to demonstrate nonexistence via nondetectability)
2. Physicality & Detection
(iii) X is physical then X is detectable (Ok)
(iv) X is detectable then X is physical (theists have to deny this)
So we've whittled down the possibilities to
(ii) X exists then X is detectable
(iii) X is physical then X is detectable
Suppose now X is undetectable, what would that mean?
It would mean
(v) X doesn't exist & X is nonphysical [modus tollens on (ii) and (iii)]
We have to unpack the statement "X is nonphysical". Remember that God exists but is nonphysical and so, "X is nonphysical" actually means "X exists & X is nonphysical".
If so, (v) becomes
(vi) X doesn't exist & (X exists & X is nonphysical)
By associative rule (vi) becomes
(vii) (X doesn't exist & X exists) & X is nonphysical.
We've arrived at a contradiction (bolded).
Something's off. Can't quite put my finger on where exactly I made a boo-boo!
Any help will be deeply appreciated.
Some possibilities relevant to the issue:
1. Existence & Detection (sensorily, instrumentally, etc.)
(i) X is detectable then X exists (Rejected because of hallucinations)
(ii) X exists then X is detectable (Ok, can be used to demonstrate nonexistence via nondetectability)
2. Physicality & Detection
(iii) X is physical then X is detectable (Ok)
(iv) X is detectable then X is physical (theists have to deny this)
So we've whittled down the possibilities to
(ii) X exists then X is detectable
(iii) X is physical then X is detectable
Suppose now X is undetectable, what would that mean?
It would mean
(v) X doesn't exist & X is nonphysical [modus tollens on (ii) and (iii)]
We have to unpack the statement "X is nonphysical". Remember that God exists but is nonphysical and so, "X is nonphysical" actually means "X exists & X is nonphysical".
If so, (v) becomes
(vi) X doesn't exist & (X exists & X is nonphysical)
By associative rule (vi) becomes
(vii) (X doesn't exist & X exists) & X is nonphysical.
We've arrived at a contradiction (bolded).
Something's off. Can't quite put my finger on where exactly I made a boo-boo!
Any help will be deeply appreciated.
Comments (307)
The proof of God's existence is not correlated to metaphysics. You made an impressive effort to show us some axioms or syllogisms to demonstrate the existence of God using words as physical and detectable. But I think that all of these doesn't work because God as a subterfuge depends a lot on faith.
Theists and religious tend to believe in the unknown and that's why they are devotees. Their faith make them seem blind towards God's mercy. They do not care if you can demonstrate the existence of a divinity. They just believe on it.
[i]Christianity is a religion that sees itself as a promise of life, hope, comfort, and love. "Gospel" in English is from Old English gôd, "good," and spell, "tale." This translates Greek Euangélion, "good news" -- whence the term "evangelism."
Many people, however, see the promise of Christianity as a threat, not as good news. If you don't join this religion, you are going to Hell, no matter how good a person you may otherwise be. Outside the Church is damnation. Jesus said (John 14:6), "I am the way, the truth, and the life: no man cometh unto the Father, but by me."[/i]
Faith, Works, and Knowledge.
Yes, and that which is real (i.e. ineluctable, more-than-intersubjective) is independent of "faith".
I think, in matters of ontology, it is 'essential' to determine the conditions or properties which objectively differentiate an entity (1) as real (actual) from unreal (imaginary) and (2), if real, then as existing (present-causal) from not existing (absent-noncausal); therefore, to the degree this difference is indiscernible, I think we lack grounds to claim that any such entity is either "real" or "exists" (thus, with respect to "god/s", reliance on (suspension of disbelief in mythopoetic) make believe aka "faith" (re: Tillich, Kierkegaard ...) is required).
:up: Excellent overview of the problem, mon ami!
Then something's wrong with one/both of the following claims (our premises/assumptions)
(ii) X exists then X is detectable
(iii) X is physical then X is detectable
That is to say
(viii) X exists & X is undetectable (That you can't detect ghosts doesn't imply ghosts don't exist)
or/and
(ix) X is physical & X is undetectable (That you can't detect dark matter doesn't mean dark matter is nonphysical)
How do we define nonexistence?
Like this I suppose:
(x) X is undetectable then X doesn't exist.
The contrapositive (logically equivalent) of (x) is:
(ii) X exists then X is detectable
So, to keep ourselves sane (as possible), we have to retain (ii).
That means (iii) is false or (ix) is true i.e. X is physical & X is undetectable. But then we just concluded that if X is undetectable, X doesn't exist (x) and (ii).
(ix) X is physical & X is undetectable (has to be true to avoid the contradiction in the OP).
(x) X is undetectable then X doesn't exist.
Unpack (ix) and we get
(xi) X exists & X is physical & X is undetectable (we're at no time more certain of the existence of something than when that something is physical)
(x) X us undetectable then X doesn't exist
The two [(x) and (xi)] constitute a contradiction!!!
:chin:
It is understandable that all of your premises make contradictions. You keep trying to put some titanic characteristics just to confirm God's existence: Tangible, physical, detectable or undetectable, etc... As much as I remember if I am not wrong, theists tend to defend that God is omnipotent. Inside this "virtue" it is said that God is and is not at all times and in every place. The failure of developing a grandiose image of God ends up of having a lot of contradictions. This is why, as I said previously, you would need a lot of faith to believe in something that you never "seen" neither spoken to.
Kant's statement, "I have therefore found it necessary to deny knowledge, in order to make room for faith," is one of the most famous things he wrote. However, as we will see in the text, neither he nor Jakob Fries meant by Glaube, "faith".
Kant: The Jewish faith was, in its original form, a collection of mere statutory laws upon which was established a political organization; for whatever moral additions were then or later appended to it in no way whatever belong to Judaism as such. Judaism is really not a religion at all but merely a union of a number of people who, since they belonged to a particular stock, formed themselves into a commonwealth under purely political laws, and not into a church; nay, it was intended to be merely an earthly state...
The Kant-Friesian Theory of Religion and Religious Value
This premise presumes physical existence, hence knowable via the 5 senses.
But most modern god-concepts deny that premise. Hence knowable only via the 6th sense of Reasoning or Intuition. So, the premise is prejudicial to most modern god-definitions.
One alternative premise is that "god is existence", the Necessary Being.
But how do you detect "necessity"? By physical or intuitive or logical processes? :smile:
PS__Apparently, most god-believers trust their Intuition more than their Reason. But philosophers seem less reliant on intuition, so require some Objective evidence to supplement their Rational deductions.
An excerpt on Tillich's negative theology:
[quote=New World Encyclopedia;https://www.newworldencyclopedia.org/entry/Paul_Tillich#The_non-existence_of_God] Tillich came to make the paradoxical statement that God does not exist, for which he has been accused of atheism. "God does not exist. He is being itself beyond essence and existence. Therefore to argue that God exists is to deny him."
That statement is a continuation of Tillich’s earlier conclusion that God cannot be conceived as an object, no matter how lofty. We cannot think of God as a being that exists in time and space, because that constrains Him, and makes Him finite. Thus we must think of God as beyond being, above finitude and limitation, the power or essence of being itself. There is a clear logic in Tillich’s development here, and he makes it plain that denying God’s “existence” is in fact needed in order to affirm him. Still, at times he makes it hard to avoid the impression that there simply “is” no God, which is largely due to his use of the notion of existence. Again, the apologetic nature of Tillich’s discourse should be remembered. The purpose of such statements is to forcibly remove incorrect notions from the minds of his audience by creating a state of shock..[/quote]
This was also made explicit by John Scotus Eriugena:
[quote=John Scotus Eriugena; https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/scottus-eriugena/#FourDiviNatu]things accessible to the senses and the intellect are said to [s]be[/s] exist, whereas anything which, “through the excellence of its nature” (per excellentiam suae naturae), transcends our faculties are said not to [s]be[/s] exist. According to this classification, God, because of his transcendence is said not to [s]be[/s] exist. He is “nothingness through excellence” (nihil per excellentiam). ...This mode (of thinking) illustrates Eriugena’s original way of dissolving the traditional Neoplatonic hierarchy of being into a dialectic of affirmation and negation: to assert one level is to deny the others. In other words, a particular level may be affirmed to be real by those on a lower or on the same level, but the one above it is thought not to be real in the same way. If humans are thought to exist in a certain way, then angels do not exist in that way.[/quote]
The point being that according to today's empiricist philosophy only that which can be conceived of as existing in time and space is considered real. There's no conceptual category for the transcendent, and no way of conceptualising it or reaching it through discursive philosophy.
See also God does not exist.
I went over that in my preceding posts. Rejecting If X exists, X is detectable means the following:
(viii) X exists & X is undetectable.
Now the question is how do we define nonexistence?
What are our options?
(i) X is detectable then X exists (Rejected because of hallucinations)
(ii) X exists then X is detectable (Ok, can be used to demonstrate nonexistence via nondetectability)
You recommended we discard (viii). Doing that means giving up our only method of inferring nonexistence (ii).
Quoting Gnomon
Interesting points! Intuition as opposed to logic and that intriguing way of defining God as existence itself.
[quote=Ms. Marple]Most interesting.[/quote]
I believe in God. That is, I believe there exists an omnipotent, omniscient and omnibenevolent person. Those are the essential attributes.
But it is not essential that God be non-physical. To be clear: I think God is non-physical. But it's not essential to being God that God be non-physical. God is omnipotent, so if God wanted to he could make himself physical. No theist worth their salt should believe that God 'must' be non-physical. God can be physical if he wants to be.
Also you seem to be conflating sensible things with physical things and then thinking that if something is not physical it is not detectable.
Non-physical things are detectable. I can detect my own thoughts, for instance, yet they are not physical things but states of a non-physical thing - me.
Idealists do not believe any physical things exist. But they're still aware of apples and trees and so forth. That's becuase they think that apples and trees and so forth are made of sensations (as well as being detected by means of them).
Plus, even our senses are powerless to enable us to detect anything without the assistance of our reason, and so it is really by reason - not sense - that we detect things. And we can certainly detect non-sensible things by means of our reason. Reasons themselves, for instance, are not sensibly detectable, yet exist and we are aware of them.
You are referring to Jesus, yes?
So, someone who thinks an omnipotent being is essentially non-physical is confused. They clearly don't understand what they're talking about.
No, as in God did not manifest in physical form as Jesus? Then what would be an example?
What? Why are you mentioning Jesus? I don't know. God could make himself into a cat if he wanted. My point is a philosophical one. An omnipotent being can be physical, for an omnipotent being has the power to make himself physical if he so chooses. He wouldn't be omnipotent if he couldn't.
Okay. Cannot debate myth.
YOu can't debate at all mate.
God just became me. He wants to tell you to lay off the insults. God out.
No he didn't. God's maximally intelligent.
God told me to tell you to grow up and stop being a child throwing tantrums. God out.
An eye-opener!
It is true that defining God in terms of greatness, the greatest being imaginable to be precise, tends to create paradoxes - the omnipotence attribute is particularly problematic.
However, my inquiry is an attempt to find out how the following hang together in a manner of speaking
1. Existence
2. Detectability
3. Physicality
4. Nonphysicality (God being the examplar)
Let me try and simplify my problem in a few questions
1. How do we know X exists?
We can't! There are no sufficient condition for existence.
X is detectable doesn't imply X exists (hallucinations/simulation).
2. How do we know X doesn't exist?
We've used one rule to draw the conclusion that something doesn't exist:
(a) X is undetectable then X doesn't exist.
3. How do we know X is physical?
Possibilities:
(b) X is detectable then X is physical.
One needs to unpack X is physical. We're 100% certain that
(b1) X is physical then X exists.
So,
(b) X is detectable then X is physical implies
(b2) X is detectable then X exists (recall we had to deny this because of hallucinations)[hypothetical syllogism (b) and (b1)]
Ergo, X is detectable then X is physical is unacceptable.
That is it's possible that
(b3) X is detectable & X is nonphysical.
---
(c) X is physical then X is detectable.
No issues here.
4. How do we know X is nonphysical?
Look at (c). There's a sufficient condition for nonphysicality:
(d) X is undetectable then X is nonphysical.
Salient points:
(a) X is undetectable then X doesn't exist.
(b3) X is detectable & X is nonphysical.
(c) X is physical then X is detectable.
(d) X is undetectable then X is nonphysical.
(c) and (d) are the same proposition (contrapositive)
Look at (a) and (d). Together they imply that
(e) X is undetectable then (X doesn't exist & X is nonphysical).
Conclusions:
(f) God has to be detectable otherwise God doesn't exist.
(g) Detectability doesn't imply physicality
That's all I could muster.
:up:
Already answered above. :smirk:
You know something exists when you believe it exists, it does exist, and you have epistemic reason to believe it exists.
And we can know that God exists.
If you think we can't know that God exists, you either think there's reason to think we can't know that God exists, or you think there's no reason to think we can't know GOd exists but you believe it anyway.
In the latter case - that is, if you think there's no reason to think we can't know God exists, but you still believe we can't know God exists - you're just being dogmatic. That is, you're just asserting something you can't defend.
In the former case, you acknowedge that reasons exist. Well, those can't exist unless God does. So God exists.
1. X is undetectable then X doesn't exist.
That means
2. X exists then X is detectable [1 contrapositive]
But those who believe in God claim that
3. X (God) exists & (but) God (X) is undetectable.
2 & 3 lead to a contradiction: God exists & (God is undetectable & God is detectable).
That means either 1/2 or 3 or both is/are false.
If you say 1/2 is false, we lose our test for nonexistence (nondetectability).
If 3 is false then either God doesn't exist or God is detectable. This means 1/2 is true. God as an undetectable entity that exists is in jeopardy.
Then there's the definition of physicality we haveto worry about.
What do you mean if we say x is physical?
4. X is physical then X exists (we're 100% sure that physical things exist).
But then that means
5. If X doesn't exist then X is nonphysical.
Also,
6. X is physical then X is detectable. The truth of this claim is undeniable. However, it's equivalent to
7. X is undetectable then X is nonphysical.
Compare 7 to 1. Now we can't tell the difference betwixt X doesn't exist and X is nonphysical.
:confused:
You sound like Anselm.
All religious books also talk about a third world war. A war that will end all wars. And they also speak of a person who will come and lead that war. For many this seems unlikely, but now there has been a publication in 2016 by the Dutch scientist. He has predicted using mathematical formulas that WW3 will start in 2022 at the latest. If you follow the news a little bit, what he says may come true.
Something is only believed to be true if there is effective scientific and visible proof of it. That means if WW3 starts this year, then the religious books are right. And if there really is someone who comes to interfere during WW3 (the so-called antichrist), then I think proof of the existence of god has been provided.
Modern philosophers tend to distrust Intuition, as a hasty & emotional instead of methodical & rational way of knowing. But Intuition is fundamental, subjective, and personal, hence it makes the strongest case for belief. Only after those intuitive embryos-of-thought are established can the rational faculties analyze them to select the ones that conform to logical structures, and that can survive the gauntlet of objective social criticism. However, even those ideas that are strong enough to become firm beliefs, are based on limited information. Which is why Bayesian inference was developed, to update our provisional beliefs with additional evidence. Bayes whittled normal human logic, based on conventional concepts (words), down to a mathematical (statistical) analysis of probability. But that bare-bones abstract result may lack the emotional impact of visceral Intuition as the foundation of faith.
Since I have concluded, intuitively & logically, that our world (our reality ; our existence) is highly improbable, given that its fundamental process is Entropy -- inevitably leading to death & disappearance -- the necessity for an exogenous causal force seems undeniable. Plato & Aristotle referred to that logically essential force as the "First Cause" or "Unmoved Mover". But they seemed to assume that the Causal Principle of our existence must also lie outside the space-time devolution from Order (Logos) to Disorder (Chaos). In other words it must exist eternally, as Absolute Potential for the creation of Actual Reality from Possible Ideality. Plato also used the term "Chaos" (disorder) to describe that eternal resource of potential stuff. But he didn't mean it was chaotic in the modern sense, but merely that it was unformed potential (like malleable clay) that could be molded into enformed things & organisms.
Those ancient philosophers also spoke of "Being & Becoming". With that in mind, I think of our evolving space-time universe as Becoming, and the timeless power-to-exist-physically as absolute Being. Or, as others spoke of the same ultimate source of existence : "the ground of being". Therefore, as an alternative to the conventional religious label for that enigmatic eternal unknowable omnipotent Cause-of-all-effects, I sometimes refer to it simply as "BEING". :nerd:
BEING :
[i]* In my own theorizing there is one universal principle that subsumes all others, including Consciousness : essential Existence. Among those philosophical musings, I refer to the "unit of existence" with the absolute singular term "BEING" as contrasted with the plurality of contingent "beings" and things and properties. By BEING I mean the ultimate “ground of being”, which is simply the power to exist, and the power to create beings.
Note : Real & Ideal are modes of being. BEING, the power to exist, is the source & cause of Reality and Ideality. BEING is eternal, undivided and static, but once divided into Real/Ideal, it becomes our dynamic Reality.[/i]
BothAnd Blog Glossary
Detectable implies material, but God is not material.
Therefore "detectable" should be defined so that it includes nonmaterial detection, ie. psychological phenomena, fulfillment of prayer and similar.
DENIED. ~Laozi & Zhuangzi
DENIED. ~Epicurus
DENIED. ~B. Spinoza
DENIED. ~A. Einstein
DENIED. ~H. Everett
DENIED. ~J. Hartle & S.Hawking
DENIED. ~D. Deutsch
Et al....
Not at all "undeniable", G; just another false dichotomy.
I like the way you make ideals another type of being. It's close to what I said once in another thread. There's no nonexistence, just different kinds of existence. I think Meinong of Meinong's jungle fame thought along the same lines. On this view it's wrong to say God, or anything else for that matter, doesn't exist. God exists but not in the same way as (say) a rock! Wordplay?
What about so-called hallucinations/mirages?
We know upfront mirages are fake because it can be proven.
hallucinations, I don't know.
but things such as clinical death are real.
I like how those who've really thought things through speak/act. Clinical death! :up:
There is a book called "life after death" (I don't recall who wrote it), it talks about survivors of clinical death, and their experiences.
most of them shared similar experiences, things such as "out of body" and "light and the end of tunnel" phenomena.
Well, for some of us who got a raw deal in life, I hope there's a second chance!
Of course, it's wordplay. But it's also Idea-play. That's what humans do. Those who deny Idealism, are repudiating Humanism. What distinguishes humans from animals? Mostly, it's the ability to convert sensory impressions into the communicatable concepts we call "Words" & "Ideas". We can then play-around with those "Memes" to construct worldviews that are more-than just sensory appearances. Those imaginary models of the world are what we label "Ideals" ; mental replicas of reality with improvements. They go beyond as-is Reality into as-if Ideality. And the positive result of that reasoning from IS to IF is what we call "Creativity". Of course, some creative ideas fall short of feasibility : e.g. Elon Musk says he wants to buy CocaCola, so he can put the Cocaine back in. I hope he's pulling-the-leg of Twitter twits.
Ironically, adamant philosophical Realists dismiss the practicality of the unrealistic mental tool that makes Philosophy possible : the ability to abstract the essence of specific concrete (real) things into general & universal (ideal) principles, which exist only in the un-real realm of Ideality. World-dominating human culture is the practical product of the homo sapiens ability to Idealize mundane Reality into Utopias & Sky Castles, that seldom become real, but do give us an advantage over the animals, who just make-do with what Nature provides -- humans make-believe. Without our talent for improving upon Nature, we would still be shivering cave-dwellers without fangs & claws. The Garden of Eden does not exist in the past, but only in the future world of Ideality. :smile:
Ideality :
[i]* In Plato’s theory of Forms, he argues that non-physical forms (or ideas) represent the most accurate or perfect reality. Those Forms are not physical things, but merely definitions or recipes of possible things. What we call "Reality" consists of a few actualized potentials drawn from a realm of infinite possibilities.
1. Materialists deny the existence of such immaterial ideals, but recent developments in Quantum theory have forced them to accept the concept of “virtual” particles in a mathematical “field”, that are not real, but only potential, until their unreal state is collapsed into reality by a measurement or observation. "To measure" is to extract meaning into a mind. [Measure, from L. Mensura, to know; from mens-, mind]
2. Some modern idealists find that scenario to be intriguingly similar to Plato’s notion that ideal Forms can be realized, i.e. meaning extracted, by knowing minds. For the purposes of this blog, “Ideality” refers to an infinite pool of potential (equivalent to a quantum field), of which physical Reality is a small part. A traditional name for that fertile field is G*D. But you can call it the Enformation Field, if you like. [/i]
BothAnd Blog Glossary
Why does reason depend on the existence of an omnipotent, omniscient and omnibenevolent person?
That mind will be omnipotent, because Reason's attitudes constitutively determine what's possible (all the laws of logic are prescriptions of Reason). Thus for her all things are possible as she is not bound by her own prescriptions.
That mind will be omniscient because Reason's attitudes constitutively determine whether a belief qualifies as an item of knowledge.
That mind will be omnibenevolent because Reason's attitudes constitutively determine what's good and bad. Reason will have a pro-attitude towards her own character, given she could change it if she in any way disapproved of it. Thus Reason will be good.
That mind will qualify as God, then (as possession of those properties is sufficient to qualify). If reasons exist, Reason exists. Reason is God. Therefore, if reasons exist then God exists.
Did you know, I'm sure you do, that mathematically speaking, everything reduces to points, lines, curves, each one of these translatable into an equation? In other words, if you want to know what Plato's world of forms looks like, go to bed with the Queen of the sciences (mathematics).
:yikes: :monkey: :lol:
If p, then q.
If q, then t
Therefore, if p then t
P
Therefore t.
There - wet your pants.
Don't you think ithat rather makes me a visionary? And the atheist scientist the one being blind?
Visionary on what? The atheist scientist being blind for what?
That's exactly what I mean!
Yes. Some ancient philosophers (Pythagoras) and modern Physicists (Mario Livio) have imagined G*D metaphorically as a Divine Mathematician. My own metaphor, based on the Enformationism thesis, is that G*D is the Cosmic Programmer. These are not the kind of deities that you would worship, as a Tyrannical Heavenly Despot. Yet you have no choice but to obey His/Her Natural Laws. Fortunately, the Math Wizard has provided enough uncertainty in Nature, for humans to take advantage of the freedom to devise workarounds that result in Culture : nature modified to suit the special needs of big-brain bi-peds without fur & claws & fangs. :smile:
PS__Plato's Forms may be imagined as logical algorithms, mathematical equations, computer programs, or as musical scores.
God is a Mathematician :
Math sounds a lot like the attributes of God—eternal, omnipresent and omnipotent. According to theoretical physicist Michio Koku, “The mind of God we believe is cosmic music, the music of strings resonating through 11-dimensional hyperspace. That is the mind of God.“
https://www.scienceandnonduality.com/article/god-is-a-mathematician
I just Googled "Meinong's Jungle", and found that his view of Nominal vs Phenomenal existence was similar to my own assumption in the Enformationism Thesis. Phenomenal reality is what we know via the 5 senses. However, we also give names to abstract concepts (e.g. metaphors ; symbols) that exist only in the mind, and sometimes treat them as-if they were real things. But Materialists & Nominalists dismiss such imaginary "objects" (e.g. Unicorns & Pegasus) as non-sense. Ironically, that view would ignore most of what makes humans different from animals : imagination & projection into the not-yet-real future. Yes, those ideal "objects" even include popular religious figures and Marvel super-heroes.
In the Enformationism thesis, I treat Ideas (mental objects) as-if they have some kind of meaningful & useful, but non-physical existence. Literally, they don't "matter", but they do signify. That assumption is based on the science of Information (knowledge), which is essentially meta-physical, but also exists in various physical forms. [see below] Since Einstein, we have known that Matter (Mass) & Energy are interchangeable, and more recently that physical Energy & abstract Information are different forms of the same Rational Potential. That Ideal "kind of existence" is what Plato's Idealism referred to as "Forms". Their way-of-being is not Actual & Physical, but Potential & Meta-Physical. For humans, especially philosophers, ideas are just as important as food & shelter.
Unfortunately, the Materialists & Physicalists & Nominalists on this forum, object to my use of an ancient Theological term, "Metaphysics", which to them implies that ghosts, spirits & souls are to be treated as Real things. Instead, my intention is merely to treat those imaginary objects-of-thought as worthy of philosophical consideration. Presumably, most animals are limited to sensing only things that have physical phenomenal existence. But humans have a sixth sense that can conceive & simulate & manipulate unreal ideas & symbols, as-if they real. And the result is often what we call "creativity". And that includes religious metaphors & analogies, that served human philosophical purposes long before the advent of Empirical Phenomenal Science. :nerd:
Meinong, an Austrian philosopher active at the turn of the 20th century, believed that since non-existent things could apparently be referred to, they must have some sort of being, which he termed sosein ("being so") https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Meinong%27s_jungle
In metaphysics, nominalism is the view that universals and abstract objects do not actually exist other than being merely names or labels. ___Wiki
Phenominalism : the doctrine that human knowledge is confined to or founded on the realities or appearances presented to the senses.
Is information the fifth state of matter? :
In 2019, physicist Melvin Vopson of the University of Portsmouth proposed that information is equivalent to mass and energy, existing as a separate state of matter, a conjecture known as the mass-energy-information equivalence principle. This would mean that every bit of information has a finite and quantifiable mass.
https://www.zmescience.com/science/news-science/information-energy-mass-equivalence/
Note --- In my thesis, I treat abstract Information as essential & fundamental, and its various physical forms as superficial & accessory. In other words, Ideal is prior to Real, as Plato assumed.
Physics & Metaphysics :
Two sides of the same coin we call Reality. When we look for matters of fact, we see physics. But when we search for meaning, we find meta-physics. A mental flip is required to view the other side. And imagination is necessary to see both at the same time.
BothAnd Blog Glossary
Anything that can be referred to is a thing. Whether it has physical existence is a different question.
Do unicorns exist? Yes. Do flying horses exist, no.
The next obvious question is, who is/are the programmer(s) [god(s)]? Someone/something must have used the information required to construct a universe, ours; this one maybe one among many others (multiverse).
What sayest thou?
And rightly so. Ain't heaven a purely non-material state of existence? And the cosmos a material copy?
Flying horses don't exist and unicorns do?
That is what I wrote.
But why don't flying horses exist?
Interesting!
Horses cannot fly.
Pegasus airlines can.
Do you believe an airplane is a horse?
Just imagine heaven. All creatures and organisms that ever lived and will live in the universe in eternal pure non-physical shapes.
Wasn't Pegasus one?
Most people would not call an airplane a horse.
But Pegasus was a horse with wings.
ok
So horses can fly. If Pegasus was a horse with wings, what else can we conclude? It's a thin line though between psychosis and sanity.
Sorry, I really don't understand what you're saying.
It's okay. What I mean is that what is considered real today can be the delusion of tomorrow.
Ok. Nothing to do with what I said.
Well, you said unicorns are real and flying horses are not. But in a year this can be the other way round.
I did not say that.
Genetic mutation (re X-men, Marvel Comics)
I think you didn’t understand the quote. This is not about believe or not in the hell, heaven, God, etc… and another kind of subterfuge. Christianity (as much as other religious masses) has always been a threat to those people different from them. Back in the day, being an atheist was punished by the law. Saying strong language against Christ was forbidden. The crusades, an army of Christ, killed all the members of a society with different thought or beliefs, etc…
As you see, Christianity could be a threat to free speech or democracy
You, indirectly, assumed that crusades slaughtered some people of a specific community just for religious issues.
In November 1095, at the Council of Clermont in southern France, the Pope called on Western Christians to take up arms to aid the Byzantines and recapture the Holy Land from Muslim control. This marked the beginning of the Crusades. Crusades
Quoting whollyrolling
Then, according to your own thoughts, Christianity can only be developed with totalitarianism. As crusades did…
I think the point is that crusades were justified.
You are trying to change the topic or mix it but I will not fall in that trick. Jerusalem is not part of our discussion. The city is even far away from Europe. I just put some examples of how crusades (tended) to finish Muslims just for religious purposes.
You can try to turn the tables but the historical fact is that one: crusades were an invention of Christianity to vanish Muslims or whatever groups different from them
Holy land according to your own religious beliefs. But Jerusalem is in nowadays: One of Israel's Basic Laws, the Jerusalem Law of 1980, refers to "complete and undivided" Jerusalem as the country's capital. All of the institutions of the Israeli government are located within Jerusalem, including the Knesset, the residences of the Prime Minister (Beit Aghion) and President (Beit HaNassi), and the Supreme Court. While Israel's claim to sovereignty over West Jerusalem is more widely accepted by the international community, its claim to sovereignty over East Jerusalem is regarded as illegitimate, and East Jerusalem is consequently recognized by the United Nations as Palestinian territory that is occupied by Israel
Enformationism is my personal worldview, based on 21st century Quantum & Information theories. Scientists are beginning to conclude that shape-shifting Information (mind-matter-energy) is the fundamental element of the real world. So, I have concluded that, logically, there must a Cosmic Mind or Programmer to set-up the creative progressive program that we call "Evolution". However, it's neither a Scientific model, nor a Religious myth, but merely serves as a Philosophical perspective on the world "in which we live and move and have our being". I don't have any privileged knowledge of the Enformer/Programmer, so I resort to the use of various metaphors, instead the usual G*D concept, to refer to the ultimate source of our world (e.g. BEING -- the power to exist). :smile:
PS___If the notion of invisible Information, as both the energy and the matter of reality, is hard to wrap your mind around, check-out Spinoza's theory of "Single Substance" = Nature = God.
Enformationism :
[i]As a scientific paradigm, the thesis of Enformationism is intended to be an update to the obsolete 19th century paradigm of Materialism. Since the recent advent of Quantum Physics, the materiality of reality has been watered down. Now we know that matter is a form of energy, and that energy is a form of Information.
As a religious philosophy, the creative power of EnFormAction is envisioned as a more realistic version of the antiquated religious notions of Spiritualism. Since our temporary world had a beginning, it's hard to deny the concept of creation. So, an infinite First Cause is proposed to serve as both the energetic Enformer and the malleable substance of the enformed world.[/i]
BothAnd Blog Glossary
Yes. Quantum scientists & Cosmologists (mathematical theorists, not empirical pragmatists) are coming to the conclusion that invisible-intangible Information (mathematical ratios between 1s & 0s) is the essence of material reality. Based on that axiomatic assumption, some have postulated a Mathematical Universe, or a Cosmic Computer Simulation. But my layman's thesis is a bit more down-to-earth. For personal & philosophical purposes, I assume that our temporary & contingent world was created in the Big Bang, and that the creative process continues to this day. It seems to be progressing in complexity (e.g intelligence), and heading toward some unknowable destination, that some call "Omega Point".
The First Cause/Creation concept implies that the BB was not an astronomically unlikely accident, but an intentional construct. So, I imagine that the Cause was like a Computer Programmer, who embedded an evolutionary algorithm into the mother-board of the BB Singularity, then pressed the "Enter" button. Voila! the material world is the result of ciphering objects & actions from the Laws & Algorithms. It's a neat theory, but as a being limited to space-time, I have no way of gaining direct knowledge of anything that "existed" before the beginning of Time : i.e. Eternity.
Therefore, I can't claim to have any privileged knowledge of the presumed Programmer, or of any other 'verses that might be out there in the mysterious Great Beyond. However, bowing to Ockham's Razor, I don't "multiply entities". So, I think of the Ultimate Source, not as people or things, but as a universal Principle of Existence, that I label, "BEING".
Note -- The initial Singularity is often compared to a Black Hole, which is a repository of Information. But in reverse : the Information comes out of it, spewing stars & planets into empty space.
I don't agree, although the ebformation thesis is interesting and has a warranted applicability if applied to the relation between brain and physical world. But when applied to the material world of particles and their interactions it assumes a hidden reality that is not present, in my humble opinion.
A computerchip crammed with usable information weight a fraction more than an empty chip, but this doesn't mean that information can be weighed.
What comes out of the singularity are two universes filled with particles. They interact by means of the vacuum between them. Initially there are large scale structures formed. Vast amounts of particles condensing into massive cosmic droplets, due to the quantitatively small but attractive nature of gravity. The interactions that resist keeps these structures from forming black holes and around the spherical distributions that start to shine like stars (and in fact are stars) life develops on planets that periodically are exposed to the blackness and the cold of the universal void at night and the white light and the warmth of soothing star at day. All creatures with brains enactively create a universe that suits their needs and while interacting and playing with fellow creatures they little by little create ideosyncratic habitats. There are no zeroes and ones involved in the whole cosmic process and the it from bit is founded on a modern day computing fairy tale. There are no quantum computers (or Turing machines) running behind the scene computing the behavior of particles, nor is the brain a computing machine or a universal Türing machine).
[quote=Johann Bernoulli (said of Isaac Newton after Newton sent him a solution for the brachiostochrone problem)]Tanquam ex ungue leonem (We recognize the lion by his claw).[/quote]
Don't take that scientist's loose talk about Information having Mass too literally. He's thinking of Information as a "state of Matter". Instead, I view Matter as a form of Information. That's because Information (e.g. mathematical ratios) seems to be fundamental to physical and meta-physical reality.
Raw unformed Information is like a statistical Probability, all Potential nothing Actual. But as Pure Information changes forms, from weightless Mind-stuff, to statistical Potential, to Energy, to Matter, it becomes more physical and more massive. For example at light-speed, a Photon (pure potential energy) has no mass, but as it slows down, it gains mass, until it eventually becomes Matter. (E=MC^2). :nerd:
Could information be the fundamental "stuff" of the universe? :
https://www.pbs.org/wgbh/nova/article/is-information-fundamental/
Please "logically demonstrate" that evolution entails a "Cosmic Mind" (whatever that is). :eyes:
Sorry for butting in 180 Proof, but I couldn't resist - the temptation was too much to resist.
You're, for certain, aware of the Duck Test.
If it looks like a duck, swims like a duck, and quacks like a duck, it must be a duck! :grin:
So ... "it's Wabbit season again, is it?" :smirk:
What's up doc? :grin:
An old saying is that "you can know the artist by his art". Likewise, you can know the Creator by the nature of his Creation. So, we can infer some characteristics of the Programmer by looking into the features of the Program (e.g. evolution). Some describe G*D as perfect Goodness. Others think that G*D is a "respecter of persons". But homo sapiens is a late development in evolution, and we don't get special treatment from Nature.
Therefore, since Evolution is neither Good nor Evil, but a bit of both, I assume the Cause of our existence was Neutral (i.e. BothAnd). Hence, it's only from the biased human perspective that whatever happens is judged by how it affects me & mine. What we call good & evil could be interpreted as merely necessary variations on the Hegelian (good/evil ; positive/negative) path to the ultimate output. So, humanity may seem be the current high-point of evolution, but in the-long-run we might be just one more step on the ladder to the final program output (e.g. Omega Point -- whatever that might be). :cool:
-here is some help....god is not a philosophical topic, like magic is not a philosophical topic.
You might find logical contradictions...but magic can be adjusted since it doesn't have to follow any rules of our reality.
Unfortunately if you do a quick search on how many discussions include the word god/creator and Science/Scientific you will find that 315 (with yours) mention god and only 181 have science in their title.
Is it then reasonable to conclude that ethics wasn't top on the list of God's priorities?
A more interesting question is, is this world, as Leibniz believed, the best of all possible worlds? A scientific proof of that would look like this: Given carbon-based life like ours, the other parameters of our universe that make life and goodness possible are such that they also permit death and evil. The question can be reformulated for dystheism also.
:up: :100:
Not both....but can either or depending of the situation.
-" I wish there was an international treaty that says all weapons used in warfare must be for good "
There is an international treaty and laws, this is why we have the term war crime.
-"(for instance, if you shoot someone, do it in such a way that you save that person's life or thereabouts)."
-so why shooting someone in the first place? Injuring a person is "for good"? What if the injury you inflict leaves a chronic pain to that person or perminant disability.
Quoting Agent Smith
-Neither Glabarclurchen's List includes ethics. My point is that you first need to demonstrate the existence of a god, then demonstrate that he has a legitimate interest in putting up lists and then show that ethics isn't in it.
In reality nothing in our world has a "dual purpose". Purpose needs to be demonstrated, not assumed. What we label goodness and evil are just fluctuations in the process called life or existence that we evaluate according to our preferences.
Alexius Meinong's (vide Meinong's Jungle) thoughts echo John Scotus Eriguena's. Mind twins separated by nearly a thousand or so years! Do such instances of multiple discovery (same idea but different people living in different times) have any bearing on reincarnation (Buddhism/Hinduism) [memories of past lives]?
Reincarnation is a boo-word. Best to steer clear of it.
If everything, and I mean everything, could be shown to be "that than which nothing greater can be conceived" or thereabouts, modal realism would be true (everything possible would exist/be actual). Every person or thing truly is perfect given the givens oui? As a rather controversial example, Hitler was perfect considering the set of experiences he went through - he was the best possible person he could be, factoring in his circumstances. :chin:
-Existence has termporal qualities by necessity. Something can not exist for zero seconds...
I think that in our efforts to protect concepts with great emotional value we are willing to make up concepts that have no meaning or descriptive power. "something existing for zero time and without minimum requirements criteria of what it means to exist in the first place"...or "nothing being a state of being before something came to be".
Superstitious ideas can only be the subject of Philosophy of Absurdism.
I guess for most people will not appear to be worthy of a philosophical analysis. After all what makes a superstitious claim worthy for a philosophical discussion is the number of people accepting it.
I mean who would ever accept that excuse....but by introducing "magic"(special pleading) fully grown ups will accept anything and they will even apply the noble title of Philosophy on top.
I mean if this isn't mental gymanstics/mastrurbation what exactly is it.
So do numbers exist? Scientific principles? The law of the excluded middle?
I say no. In my lexicon, these are real, but they don’t exist, precisely because they don’t come into, or go out of, existence. Rather they belong to the realm of what must be so, in order for things to exist.
Consider that in quantum physics, the orbit of electrons have values that can only be defined in terms of integers. That is a fundamental constraint on the nature their existence. Yet the fact that it’s an integer can’t be said to be causal in any direct physical sense. It’s not as if integers ‘do’ something, like exert a force. It’s rather that they are indicative of a constraint, which the electron must conform to in order to exist.
You have a point, but, from what I gather, this is part and parcel of philosophy and science. Philosophy is more deconstruction than construction if you catch my drift à la Socrates who was the wrecking ball of the ideaverse. After him, all that was left were piles of rubble where once majestic belief systems had been erected! He was the Genghis Khan of the world of beliefs.
-"So do numbers exist? Scientific principles? The law of the excluded middle?"
-those are concepts that describe qualities and properties of reality but they do not exist in the way physical entities or processes do (well if you laser cut a number on pvc......that is a different story lol)
So it all has to do with how we use the word "exist".
The do not exist but they are real because they describe real things in the world.
Quoting Wayfarer
-I gave an answer without reading your answer and I am glad that you use the same definitions and standards to explain why concepts do not exist as entities and why they are real.
Quoting Wayfarer
I am not sure if I would ever use that term "realm of what must be so''. In my opinion those are descriptions of the objective picture of reality.
I like your style! :up:
The meaning of the word ‘to exist’ is the fundamental question of philosophy. You skated over a lot of very heavy subjects with a very brief reply there, lol. :meh:
-Well the parcel that Philosophy and science has to open is....>Science provides additional facts to our epistemology and Philosophy tries to understand what that means through the construction of wise claims.
Philosophy job is to deconstruct and put things back again in a more meaningful way, but what good it makes when .....the address(language) on that parcel ships it straight to the realm of Absurdism?
I mean we understand things through concepts and things we already understand. i.e. If you ask me how your phone doesn't work...and the answer was" it does work but its on a specific mode which is indistinguishable from not working"...then you have a useless explanation.
-That is because in those "energetic" scales "physicality" doesn't emerge. Physical properties emerge in larger scales (molecules and their structures).
Don't get me wrong. Electrons' values are natural phenomena but we shouldn't confuse them with physicality.
Quoting Wayfarer
-So the manifestation of the energetic footprint of electrons depends on that specific value.
This manifestation of their energetic property allows them to interact with other systems and particles.
Interaction is one of the qualities that defines "existence". Are we in agreement?
The states of electrons around a nucleus are just as physical as any physical macro system.
Quoting Nickolasgaspar
No, it's not that which allows them to interact. That's a wrong statement and logically false.
Quoting Gnomon
Yes. And that state has a tiny amount more energy than the uninformed state. Gibbs free energy is added. If massless pure kinetic energies interact, an effective mass emerges.
-Its natural and energetic. Physicality rises in larger scales.
-"No, it's not that which allows them to interact. That's a wrong statement and logically false."
-No it isn't and as a superior male I am right (see what I did there?).
Wow its really easy to argue by your standards !
An electron is both natural and energetic. Around a nucleus, depending on the orbital, it has varying angular momenta. though it's energy is well defined.
Quoting Nickolasgaspar
Like I said, in investigating nature, the physical, material world, high logical standards and proofs should be applied to our arguments about the material investigated. Your arguments about the electron are nonsensical and unsubstantiated or proven. Nor is there evidence (see what I did here?).
Quoting Hillary
-Read again, I never said it wasn't!!!!! I said its natural but it lacks the physicality we observe in larger scales
Quoting Hillary
-No it is'nt. You just proved that you are attacking a strawman I never said that electrons are not natural or energetic. I only pointed out that you won't find physical properties in that scale (rigidity,liquidity etc etc etc).
Btw when you make claims about the nature of stuff (you said something about being divine) that is also an nonsensical and unsubstantiated claim. when you claim "heaven exists" whatever that means you need to demonstrate that claim before using it as a principles for your metaphysical speculations.
The electron behaves differently from a tennis ball. But it's still a physical object. It lacks the physicality of the tennis ball but at the same time shares a lot.
:grin: @Wayfarer RUUUNNNN!
YOU BREAKED MY TOY!
WHY YOU BREAKED MY TOY?!
:cry: :groan:
I dunno what you're talking about!
:chin:
[quote=Ms. Marple]Most interesting![/quote]
I wasn't aiming for perfection you know!
You have a sad life, to you everything is :broken:
Coming from me, that's something you should think about and deeply!
The last is of course questionable. And philosophy should asks these questions, as it should question the opposite too: "God does exist. This is questionable". We can easily conceptualize gods as ethereal, spiritual, enlightened eternal beings, made of pure magical soul, while the universal life is a material finite abstraction thereof. If the finite material beings recur infinite times (but non-identical) in subsequent universes, then the eternal heavenly life can be said to be reflected in the material universe.
That is the general dominant theme in these discussion ....
A wonderful description of the state of modern "philosophy"!!!
:up:
The post it was quoted from contained a link to God does not Exist, by Bishop Pierre Whalon, so the phrase ought not to be taken literally.
This thread has now descended into juvenilia so I'll leave it at that.
No surprise, he is an Anglican so called "bishop", hah.
Our beloved bishop claims to have knowledge of God in the same way as claiming the gods look just like life in the universe. His concept of God is an intellectual abstraction which doesn't resemble the true nature of divine presences.
From the article:
"Pastafarians"... He's got a sense of humor! But why you should posit a spaghetti monster? Is that a god who eternally eats spaghetti? Well, it could be that's a true image of God. But why should God exist alone in the first place? The Greek gods were many, with distinct features, so why couldn't gods be manifold? Or animal like? Plant-like? Or slipper animal gods.
Have you heard of the crab mentality? Visit Wikipedia for more!
"Crab mentality, also known as crab theory, crabs in a bucket (also barrel, basket, or pot) mentality, or the crab-bucket effect, is a way of thinking best described by the phrase "if I can't have it, neither can you". The metaphor is derived from a pattern of behavior noted in crabs when they are trapped in a bucket."
It's confusing though. What crab behavior indicates that the crab says that if he can't have neither can I. Have what?
I would add "occurring", since "existing" limits things to static ones.
Then, a question arises: are things that are considered real only physical or are non-physical things also included? For example, if I think of a solution to a problem --which does not occur in space and is not of a physical nature-- it is real for me, and I can also prove it so that it becomes real to others too.
This, as you can see, brings in the quite common question: "Real for whom?" Because what is real for me might not be real for you and vice versa.
As a result of all that, the statement "only that which can be conceived of as existing in time and space is considered real" --besides being incomplete, as I mentioned at start-- is unfounded, or ambiguous at best.
Yes. Ethics is concerned with relationships between people, not between G*D & Man. As I see it, G*D is not Fair-to-me, but Neutral-to-all. For most people, fairness is judged from a personal & subjective perspective. But for the impersonal & objective Programmer of Evolution, variations between "good & bad" are inherent & necessary in the Hegelian Dialectic. The heuristic (trial & error) Evolutionary Algorithm searches for "fitness to an ultimate purpose", not for "fairness to the individual players" in the game. In the game of Evolution there are winners & losers, but the rule-maker is only concerned with the final outcome.
Personally, my life has been mostly good, so I don't think in terms of Dystheism. Apparently, the game is setup with rules (natural laws) that apply equally to all players. So, in that sense, the game is fair. And it's up to each player to make the best of his own talents & situations. Unfortunately, some are born without talent (advantages) and into untenable circumstances. That may seem unfair, but human culture is able to counter-balance the situation with such innovations as Charity. That's why I think of the evolving world, as an experiment in Free Will, to see if its agents are able to learn how to act morally & ethically. Regarding the final score, I assume that it will be satisfactory for the Programmer. But we'll just have to wait & see if, after The End (the Totality), the game is reset and started all over again, with a score of zero to zero. In any case, a Dystopian worldview only hurts the viewer. :smile:
PS___Best World for whom? Certainly not for me. But it's somewhere in the middle. Presumably, it will turn-out OK for the Creator's purposes. Humans can only dream of Utopias, but G*D can make it happen . . . eventually. If Free Will is the point of the game, it will take time to let it develop from top-down Natural Laws to inter-personal Cultural Laws.
Evolutionary Algorithm :
There is a problem to be solved, and the solution is conceived to lie somewhere in a space of possible candidate solutions – the search space. The evolutionary algorithm searches for good solutions in the search space using this typical structure:
https://www.sciencedirect.com/topics/biochemistry-genetics-and-molecular-biology/evolutionary-algorithm
Hegelian system :
Hegel's grand idea is "totality" which preserves within it each of the ideas or stages that it has overcome or subsumed. Overcoming or subsuming is a developmental process made up of "moments" (stages or phases).
https://www.marxists.org/reference/archive/hegel/help/easy.htm
But 'real for whom?' then raises the issue of subjectivism - that what is real is up to you or me. But it can't be that way - what if I change my mind? Does something that was real then become unreal? It can't be dependent on your or my say-so.
As for things that can be proven to others, this is one of the fundamental principles of scientific discovery. It's the whole purpose of replication and peer-review. But of course the difficulty is that scientists often start with the presumption that what is real must be validated in terms of what is observable or empirical - so here is the problem of the limitations of empiricism once again.
That is why I asked the question: what is the nature of intellectual objects, such as number, and scientific and logical principles? Mathematical platonists believe that numbers are real, in that they're the same for any observer, but they're not material, because they can only be grasped by a rational intellect.
[quote=What is Math?;https://www.smithsonianmag.com/science-nature/what-math-180975882/]Some scholars feel very strongly that mathematical truths are “out there,” waiting to be discovered—a position known as Platonism. It takes its name from the ancient Greek thinker Plato, who imagined that mathematical truths inhabit a world of their own—not a physical world, but rather a non-physical realm of unchanging perfection; a realm that exists outside of space and time. Roger Penrose, the renowned British mathematical physicist, is a staunch Platonist. In The Emperor’s New Mind, he wrote that there appears “to be some profound reality about these mathematical concepts, going quite beyond the mental deliberations of any particular mathematician. It is as though human thought is, instead, being guided towards some external truth—a truth which has a reality of its own...”
Many mathematicians seem to support this view. The things they’ve discovered over the centuries—that there is no highest prime number; that the square root of two is an irrational number; that the number pi, when expressed as a decimal, goes on forever—seem to be eternal truths, independent of the minds that found them. If we were to one day encounter intelligent aliens from another galaxy, they would not share our language or culture, but, the Platonist would argue, they might very well have made these same mathematical discoveries.
“I believe that the only way to make sense of mathematics is to believe that there are objective mathematical facts, and that they are discovered by mathematicians,” says James Robert Brown, a philosopher of science recently retired from the University of Toronto. “Working mathematicians overwhelmingly are Platonists. They don't always call themselves Platonists, but if you ask them relevant questions, it’s always the Platonistic answer that they give you.”
Other scholars—especially those working in other branches of science—view Platonism with skepticism. Scientists tend to be empiricists; they imagine the universe to be made up of things we can touch and taste and so on; things we can learn about through observation and experiment. The idea of something existing “outside of space and time” makes empiricists nervous: It sounds embarrassingly like the way religious believers talk about God, and God was banished from respectable scientific discourse a long time ago.[/quote]
That is the whole problem in a nutshell, although I don't expect that many will understand it.
Yes- in general, things exist irrespective of people believing they exist. But faith entails an unjustified belief. Belief in God can be unjustified even if a God exists.
Hypothetically, let's assume a God exists: a being who created the universe, but does not intervene in its affairs post-creation. (Christianity is false in this scenario, because it entails an interventionist god). Joe believes a God exists because he was raised Christian and unquestioningly accepted what he was taught. Joe's belief in God is unjustified, and it's mere coincidence that his belief is true (i.e. it's a Gettier problem).
Exactly. Isn't that what I have said already? You have even quoted me on that! :smile:
Quoting Wayfarer
Everyone can and does change one's mind from time to time. And one's reality changes accordingly. What difference does this make? There's no stable, static reality. Even if one thinks of reality as the physical universe --which is wrong-- that changes too, in fact, on a constant basis. There's nothing static and never changing, except such abtract ideas as infinity, eternity, God, etc.
... This will take long. I will come back to it later ...
There may not be a static reality, but some things will never change.
This is true. For instance, most of my habits never change! :grin:
[quote=Ms. Marple]Most interesting.[/quote]
You know, I've been thinking (like never before in my life)...the gap between us and God could be as big or even bigger than the gap between us and [s]animals[/s] stones! That could be one of the reasons He very rarely intervenes, despite our earnest prayers, in the affairs of humans (we're not even alive to Him).
[quote=Terry Pratchett]Evil begins when you begin to treat people as things.[/quote]
A good repartee to the so-called problem of evil!
As far as God's concerned, the universe is lifeless, biologically barren!
[quote=Neil deGrasse Tyson]So we're just sacks of chemistry![/quote]
To the guy upstairs, we're nothing more than a chemical reaction! Could you feel anything for one? :chin:
Pretty much true, but it's more correct to say: "we're not godly enough to Him"
Let's see what Gnomon has to say.
His G*D is some kinda information-based entity. He makes it a point to state, in very clear propositions, the word "god" is what in math is a variable (x, unknown, re god of the gaps).
Paradoxically, G*D (Programmer ; Cause ; Source) is both "wholly-other" and "all-encompassing". In the sense of being unbounded by space & time, G*D is in a completely different ontological category from the creatures bound to live within the constraints of an imperfect, but evolving, physical world. However, in the Enformationism thesis, we humans are integral parts of the Whole System, in a concept similar to PanPsychism. Metaphorically, we are all ideas in the Mind of G*D.
So, in an Ideal sense, G*D is US --- we are real forms of the ideal Form, we are chips off the old BEING. According to PanDeism (all is god), G*D, whose substance is EnFormAction (energy ; power to cause change, to create), converted some of His/Her metaphysical substance (ideas ; mind) into physical substance (matter). Moreover, PanEnDeism (all in god), is based on the notion that we creatures are integral parts of the ultimate Whole. But, if you are uncomfortable with overtly religious god-models, you could simply say that we are the offspring of Mother Nature.
Presumably, the Creator/Programmer knows everything we know, and feels all that we feel. We are G*D experiencing what it's like to be finite & time-bound. Some have said that we creatures are how an Ideal G*D experiences Reality. When we suffer, G*D suffers, and when we exult, G*D is elated. Unfortunately, this is all hypothetical from our narrow perspective inside the system. But, at least, it gives us some reason to feel a philosophical kinship with our silent & remote Creator, who doesn't intervene but conjoins. Some religious believers express that notion of oneness in various metaphors, such as the Footprints In The Sand poem. You may not go quite that far, but as a philosophical worldview, it's at least a positive take on the human experience, as representatives of G*D in the world. Which aspect do you express : the Divine or the Satanic? :cool:
Wholly Other :
The term “wholly other” is used in Christian theology to describe the difference between God and everything else.
https://carm.org/dictionary/wholly-other/
Footprints in the Sand :
https://www.onlythebible.com/Poems/Footprints-in-the-Sand-Poem.html
Panendeism :
http://www.supra-id.org/panendeism
God becomes the universe :
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/God_becomes_the_Universe
Quoting Agent Smith
No. That's a Calvinist Christian notion of "Sinners In The Hands of an Angry God", who sees us as loathsome insects fit only to be burned. https://wwnorton.com/college/history/archive/resources/documents/ch03_03.htm
The Creator of an imperfect, but evolving world, couldn't reasonably expect perfection from fallible creatures in an imperfect immature world. So we can only make the best use of whatever messy situation we find ourselves in. My god-model is more like the one expressed in the poem below. :smile:
Desiderata :
. . . . . . Therefore, be at peace with God, whatever you conceive Him to be. And whatever your labors and aspirations in the noisy confusion of life, keep peace in your soul. With all its sham, drudgery and broken dreams; it is still a beautiful world. Be cheerful.
https://www.sfu.ca/~wainwrig/desiderata.htm
Quoting Gnomon
*Cough* yeah but ... :chin:
Quoting 180 Proof
You're a prophet, Gnomon! :smile:
:fire:
Would you rethink your position on God if I were to say that God is just one of the many explanatory hypotheses out there for the existence of the universe? In other words, I go from God exists to God may exist.
To put this thread back on track.
Define
1. Existence: That which can be perceived (with our senses & instruments( exists.
2. Physical: That which is matter and/or energy. Both are perceived (accurately) with instruments.
Quoting Agent Smith
Every snakeoil salesman and New Age pimp just loves an easy touch like you, Smith. Working both sides of the agora like this must be thirsty work even on rainy days. "Siainte!" :smirk:
Back to the main page now! As far as I'm concerned God is still in the game but only as a hypothesis for why the universe exists (creator deity). @Gnomon , you must've noticed, doesn't restrict his idea of a G*D to religions. His thesis, EnFormAction, is what I prognosticate is religions' future in the coming few centuries to millennia. At the very least, it's an update on the metaphors we find in faiths, something religions sorely need to , well, keep up with the times. That should count as something in my humble opinion.
There's more but I have a feeling you'll take it as hogwash!
Unless you give a physical explanation of the genesis story of the quantum vacuum, gods exist. Untill now the best that can be done is push the genesis back in time.
1. A minimally-dependent field, or domain, which is relational and evident.
2. Aspects of existence (i.e. entities) consisting of structures sufficiently complex for computing defeasible models of said aspects of existence (i.e. entities).
Quoting Agent Smith
:smirk:
False dichotomy. Category errors. Hasty generalizations. Cornucopia of nonsense, ... but you already 'know" this so I won't bother spoon-feeding the breakdown.
Are there Wikipedia articles where I can get more details on what you're saying?
Call it whatever you like, my dear. You ain't got a story about the origin.
:up:
Oh! So, I'm on my own! Good to know.
This gets better every second!
That's a non-sequitur fallacy based on a wrong premise with it's roots in being a faithful disciple, (a prodigy even, maybe!) in the modern-day church of computer science. Firstly, there is no computing going on, insofar complex systems are involved, and secondly, there is no need whatsoever for models to be defeasible.
So, being a disciple (maybe even a prodigy variant!), gives little credibility to your woowoo musings, supposedly being a definition of the physical... A caleidoscopic, panoptically pandemonic fantasmagoriac apotheosis. No more, no less.
Better to be a little troll than a giant Panner!
Whatever whatever means, it's clear that your use here serves one goal only!
:rofl:
I doubt that anything like the reason & science-based Enformationism worldview will ever become a popular religion. For one thing, it's too broad & general. Yet, it works as an intellectual-philosophical attitude toward the ("stranger in a strange land") world we find ourselves trapped in (Heidegger :"thrownness"). But, a popular religion requires an emotional commitment, based on faith & hope for something better than the current imperfect world of pain & suffering. Some New Agers seem to feel a connection to something "bigger than us", as in Paganism & Panpsychism & Tat Tvam Asi ("thou art that"). And some may mistake Enformationism as a love-is-all-you-need New Age religious philosophy. But for me, it's merely a way to make sense of the mysteries (Why) that remain after materialistic Science has done all it can to reveal How the world works. :nerd:
PS___The G*D that I envision is not omnibenevolent to human creatures, but simply an impartial Observer watching the Game of Life unfold, as the players struggle to survive and to score points for their team. I haven't been able to work-out any scheme of Salvation or Deliverance, except in the hypothetical possibility of Re-Enforming (reincarnation), which recycles the Data of which I am made. But the Un-Known On-Looker hasn't revealed His/Her plans for me after the game is over. Nevertheless, we can always hope for the best. And try to win for The Team (humanity ; ecology, etc), not for the Spectator, who roots for both sides (Good & Evil).
PPS___My philosophical god-model is a form of Deism, specifically PanEnDeism. Some have tried & failed to make a viable religion of such an abstract & dispassionate concept.
Thrownness :
Geworfenheit—a kind of alienation that human beings struggle against, and that leaves a paradoxical opening for freedom.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thrownness
[i]"Into this world we're thrown /
Like a dog without a bone"[/i]
Riders on the Storm The Doors
Deism :
belief in the existence of a supreme being, specifically of a creator who does not intervene in the universe. The term is used chiefly of an intellectual movement of the 17th and 18th centuries that accepted the existence of a creator on the basis of reason but rejected belief in a supernatural deity who interacts with humankind.
___Google
Ha! 180 proof calling you a "troll" is like invader Vlad Putin calling defender Volo Zelensky a NAZI. :joke:
Panner - Urban Dictionary
Someone who is relatively big or fat but thinks and acts like he or she is buff or of average weight constantly talking about it.
https://www.urbandictionary.com ›
That which exists when mind is removed.
Good one! That captures the essence of the physical in my opinion. However, it puts us in a bind to my reckoning for how are we to determine if anything is physical without the mind getting involved?
It's not actually impossible, re Lao Tzu (Wu wei). We would need to observe withouth observing! :chin:
[quote=Obelix]Ils sont fous ces [s]Romains[/s] Chinois.[/quote]
Thank you. I would start with what we know to be true (at least one mind exists), and then see if any further assumptions about reality are warranted. Does positing the existence of mind-independent stuff solve anything? Is physicalism possible to prove? Does it lead to absurdities or contradictions?
Si, señor! I applaud the almost divine simplicty of your approach/method! Of course Descartes beat you to it but we can set that minor point aside for the moment!
So, what do we know?
[quote=Ms. Marple.]Most interesting. :chin:[/quote]
Where does "God" fit in this? Shouldn't "back on track" refer to the subject, which is "God & Existence"?
Anyway, what conclusion can be drawn after having defined "existence" and "physical"?
Well, God's the spanner in the works being a nonphysical entity that exists. I thought it better to leave him for last; for starters we could sort out what existence and physical mean.
In my own view
1. Physical: Perceivable through the senses/their extensions (instruments).
2. Existence: Perceivable, again, through the senses/their extensions (instruments) + Inferrable from data e.g. the design argument.
The sticking point: How to distinguish nonexistence from nonphysical?
Insofar as "nonphysical" entails disembodied, it's indistinguishable from "nonexistent". Perhaps X is "nonphysical", such as an idea –it is subsistent instead (Meinong et al).
True that! :clap:
What I'd like to know is how a theist can retain belief in a nonphysical being (God) and still have a coherent definition of nonexistence.
God is an idea! :chin:
Meinong! Clever chap!
Because of faith. They just have beliefs, theists do not want knowledge. Even, when they use that, they tend to commit terrible paradoxes about God's existence.
[quote=Ms. Marple]Most interesting![/quote]
If you don't give a rat's ass about logic, anything goes!
Awesome!
:up:
Quoting Agent Smith
i.e. principle of explosion (à la "fiat lux") :sparkle:
Amazing! Danke 180 Proof! From the bottom of my :heart: danke!
Last I checked, 'the vacuum' (Democritus' void) is physical
https://thephilosophyforum.com/discussion/comment/586447 :fire:
Vacuum is (scientifically) a region where the pressure is 0 Pa.
The next question what is pressure?
Pressure is the net force exerted by particles over a given area.
That means a vacuum
1. Is made of particles that don't exert a force
2. is a region where there are no particles
Nonphysical vs. Nonexistence!
https://thephilosophyforum.com/discussion/comment/693562
@Agent, I can't get it. You refer to God as "being a nonphysical entity that exists". But according to the definition of "physical" and "existence" that you offer, only physical things exist. Isn't there a crying contradiction here?
Now, this is a good occasion to mention that the definition of the words "exist" and "existence" that dictionaries give, which also reflect the general view on these terms, is very limited and/or one-sided. There are millions of things that are not physical --at least in the sense of being perceivable through the senses-- and yet we say and agree that they exist, i.e. we accept their existence. I don't know where to start ... Facts, information/data, acts/actions, ... the list is endless. Even ideas exist, at least for the individuals who have them, as well as all sort of things that individuals experience. In that sense, we can say that God exists, at least for those who have experienced his presence (in whatever way) or even can prove his existence by reasoning.
So, maybe you should approach the subject in this way ...
The issue is, it seems, rather simple: We don't question the existence of mud, but we're unsure of the existence of Golems. Why? What's the reason for this differential treatment of mud & Golems (mud beings)?
Every well-educated citizen knows the vacuum is filled with "virtual" (a very unlucky and inconsequential misnomer) interacting Planck geometries. If these are part of a 4d bulk vacuum, and 3d space and TD-time emerged on it, the question obviously becomes: who the fuck brought thát on the scene? There's only one answer possible, and you bloody well know it. So free your thoughts and let the magic in. Who cares they made it?
Aren't we all creatures from the mud? The pussins are crawling on my head! Mud is real. But without us, does mud exist? Of course, if I touch myself tomorrow, the mud is still there. Persistent stuff. But does it really exist independently of us, even if we are made of it? If the mind is made from mud, is mud mind-independent then?
Zen moments! You gotta love 'em, you gotta hate 'em. :confused:
It's called, the method of the child. Look at its bafflement when it exams, still without method or well defined aim, the small piece of shit it finds on the street. "Don't touch that! Leave it there! It's dirty shit!" "It siiiiit, geat sit mama!"
The difference lies in 1) their physicality and 2) the proof of their existence in the physical world.
However, as far as their existence is concerned, they both exist, although in different "universes": one is physical (objective) and the other is mental (subjective). OK, the second can easily be doubted. However, the first too can be doubted. For one thing, perceptions differ from one person to another. Also experiments can show different results based on different conditions etc. That is what I strongly maintain that there is no objective reality, hence the physical existence of something can also be questioned. And that is why I brought up the limitations of the definition of "existence".
See where all that leads? The term "existence" is relative. And it can be applied to both physical and [b]non-physical things.
Self-refuting? You want to make an objective claim, but you can't for the simple reason you'd have to eat your own words (I've done it my whole life, not recommended).
Also, I've been wondering. What's the difference between mass hysteria and objectivity? The psychiatric definition, from the likes of it, makes an exception for Lasègue–Falret syndrome i.e. if you have a quorum, insanity changes sign and becomes sanity. I guess the rule works in reverse as well.
:fire: That touches a chord! I like it!
Children go through a question phase!
[quote=Ms. Marple]Most interesting.[/quote]
Didn't Friedrich Nietzsche say something about this:
"A man's maturity is to have rediscovered the seriousness he possessed as a child at play."
We could, in modern approach, add the woman to this.
Do you have any level of conviction that if an object manifests in human thought then it gains 'existence,' under any definitions of any 'labels' or words you choose, such as 'physical,' 'existence' etc
Do gods or unicorns gain 'physical' or 'metaphysical' existence 'FOR A PARTICULAR INDIVIDUAL OR GROUPS PERSONAL REALITY,' because their own imagination has conjured such?
I just spent 10 mins conjuring creatures and [s]fables[/s], sorry, truths, in my head. I started easy, from the 'duocorn' (two horned flying horse) to the 'bistat,' (a humanoid which can be in any one of two states, whenever it chooses, male or female). I will employ them in my 'creation revelations' at some point.
I also started to commlink with the 'first one!' I have just received this signal, It's been traveling for 26 billion years of our perception of linear time. I have only received it today as 'that's just how the physics involved works,' only I can understand this!
I will write about the 'truth,' I have received regarding the origin of ourselves, the Universe and everything in my book which I will call (oh I don't know?........) 'SCIgod,'The truely truely true revelations.'
All must accept SCIgod or be doomed to "ignorance of the true purpose of your life and you will suffer oblivion after you die.'
If any of you wish to become a SCIgodian then I can give you the details of the monthly subscription and send you the first sacred .truthatxt file which will explain the beginning of your astounding journey towards the truth of who and what you are.
This first revelation is the truth about how Scigod first created the mathaphys and combined it with its second creation of truth, the orga. This sacred combination created the first humanoid, which SCIgod named 'godseed.' Scigod then created his companion wogodseed.
Anyway my main question remains. Are there any 'labels' or philosophical definitions or theistic tenets (classical or current) which for you, adds or assigns any aspect of existence to my above suggestions?
Would such labels or definitions help me [s]fool[/s] and [s]con,[/s] sorry, I meant, to convince some/most people of the truth of my revelation, if I drew/painted some pictures of godseed and his wife and the place they were created? Do you think that would help?
I have lots of things I [s]want[/s], sorry again, have been commanded to go forth and perform so I need the cash to start to flow in!
Thanks for reminding me of that.
Check out this profile: Aryamoy Mitra
Pity! I hoped that my suggestion about seing existence from a different angle and its relativity/subjectivity aspect --both of which actually support your thesis, what an irony!-- would appeal to you. I feel that you have just ignore them ...
All I can say is you manged to effectively highlight the point I wanted views on. What is a foolproof criterion to determine existence/nonexistence. Remember there are 4 things one has to possess the capability to affirm or deny:
1. Existence
2. Nonexistence
3. Physical
4. Nonphysical
Quoting Alkis Piskas
Apologies, my bad. I deliberately left out the parts we were on the same page on from my reply. I was afraid we might end up asinus asinum fricat (rationalization alert!).
Consider this. Unicorns, dualcorns, pentacorns, etc. are nice fantasies but gods are no fantasy, which exist because we believe in them. We can project beliefs into the material world, like projecting a value belief into the the euro coin. The coin gets an intrinsic value in relation to these beliefs. The 10 euro coin is something different than a stone because of that. Would you throw a 10 euro piece in the river. Dunno. I would, but most won't. The piece has inherent value to some. Likewise for gods. With one difference. It's not our belief that brings them into existence. I know that's your vision, the gods being a fantasy. What's the problem if they are real? There is even a way for them to communicate with us. They can't appear in the flesh. The universe would collapse. But QM offers a subtle means to communicate with us mentally. The can project themselves onto the material world like that. You could see them in cloud shapes, for example, or see them in dreams, like I did. Why is that so hard to believe?
There are more users having this quote in their favorite section! And rightly so!
If you think about it more deeply you would end up with the conclusion that all of those characteristics are contradictory towards God's existence. I cannot put an argument about existentialism if I am using, at the same time, that this object could be physical or nonphysical at the same time. Like you have to choose one or another. Not both.
Aristotle: contradictory propositions cannot both be true 'at the same time and in the same sense
The both have this one in common too:
"The tyrant dies and his rule is over; the martyr dies, and his rule commences"
Coincidental?
How can that be if the universe is no older than 13.8 billion years?
Ten minutes to conjure up a coherent consistent heaven are not enough, brother Uni! You'll have to come up with something better than bistat fantasies, entertaining as they might be. The human gods, especially your god counterpart, will laugh about it in amusement! But I think the public sees through your trickery! But who knows... In the lhbtg community, your bistat god will be embraced!
SUBTOPIC: Clear and Convincing
??. et al,
I must have misunderstood the topic at hand. I'm still looking for some evidence of the Supreme Being.
Much the the Principle of Uncertainty (Quantum Mechanics - Heisenberg) or the Principle of Sufficient Reason (Logic - Leibniz), I thought we would approach the topic from the perspective of the outside observer and moving towards the Proof that had the greater probability.
OR -- Am I completely off track?
Most Respectfully,
R
An exploded view of gods, how you imagine that?
Quoting Rocco Rosano
Why has the uncertainty principle offer a perspective on a proof that has greater probability? Do you mean a greater probability being true than the gods being true,?
[quote=Tertullian]Certum est, quia impossibile.[/quote]
It's complicated! :confused:
Quoting Agent Smith
Yeah, but what do you think about the existence of SCIgod. I don't need to convince all of the people all of the time but can I convince you, for starters?
Why are you giving me points for creativity when I am merely one of SCIgods relays. Will you accept my relayed data that SCIgod exists and can choose to be physical or nonphysical. If you become a SCIgodian and accept his love then he will physically appear to you when you are in a sanctified dreamstate!
Surely I can easily equal the validity of the Scientologists and with enough storytelling (which of course I will set way in the past.) I can even do better than L Ron Hubbard.
At the instant of the creation of our Universe, SCIgod had to employ a portion of his essence. He wanted to give humans freewill so he called upon the TauBal. TauBal was good but its sanctified use caused a tiny glitch in the singularities that SCIgod triggered from nonexistence. Although this interaction was needed to create Orga and Mathaphys, error or flaw became possible. Subatomic impurity became a threat to the sacred merging of Orga and Mathaphys. If the human race does not understand this threat by becoming SCIgodian and thus be able to know and live their lives in accordance with the love and the purity of intent as offered by the glory that is SCIgod, then our entire species could be damned to an oblivion of awareness of self after death but with no sensory input whatsoever, for eternity.
Do you think I could bite into some of that Christian cash, if I went in that kind of direction?
Do you accept your gods and assign them existence? Am I not allowed to do the same by your rules of play? Are you denying the revealed word of the truth that is SCIgod. It's not my fault you don't understand the physics that demonstrates SCIgod is real!
Quoting Hillary
If you accept SCIgod then all your confusion will abate. SCIgodians reject all tyrannies, they offer you love, brotherhood, support, family, decency, and purity as long as you live as a SCIgodian.
Yeah, That sounds quite plausible. I am sure I can gain a few subscriptions from that.
Waddyafink?
Quoting Hillary
There are no Unicorns, or Pentacorns, only deluded fools talk about such. There was in fact a Duocorn but the blessed story of the duocorn can only be understood by level 2 SCIgodians.
You my poor, poor, pain-filled lostboy who could gain so much love and support from your fellow SCIgodians, only have to agree to experience the glory of level 0 and level 1 to then be ready to receive the wondrous truth about the Duocorns.
Surely I can earn some dosh with that!
You have to become a glorious, enlightened, intelligent, loved and revered SCIgodian to find out brother!
You are a confused non-believer in the truth of SCIgod, my poor sad lostboy human.
We can save you! We can breathe wonder, vitality, purpose, love, loyalty, strength, truth and meaning into your rotting, despondent, depressed persona.
Now send me some of your f****** cash every month and follow us or else you will be damned to an eternity of self-aware oblivion. You will inherit UTTER darkness after death and you will not be able to interact with anything or receive any sensory input at all! Yet you will remain self-aware, FOR ETERNITY. BE AFRAID! MY POOR DAMMED FOOLISH LOSTBOY!
Alternatively and for one week only! You can purchase our level 0 introductory .truthatxt file, not for the incredible, glorious cost of £100, Not even for the unbelievable bargain of £50 but for a mere £34.99.
Come my poor lostboy. Find yourself, find who you are and what you are. Join our loving community of SCIgodians.
Yeah, I think I'm gonna be rich! Waddyafink?
Well, it would be silly to ignore a potential revenue stream wouldn't it!
Yeah, you forgot to include SCIgodian proof.
You will experience this proof when you can enter the sanctified dreamstate.
But you need to join first! :naughty:
I'd say, belief formation occurs via two ways:
1. Rationally: I'd grill you like a chicken. :chin:
2. Emotionally: If your story stirs the right kinda feelings in me, I might ignore your logical errors. :smile:
The charioteer does have two horses [one, all brain, the other all heart; have you come across xin (heart-mind)?] according to Plato.
I haven't gone mad or anything, quite the opposite. I think it's important to fully understand how the woo woo can be employed by the nefarious to manipulate primal human fear and personal frailty.
Theism (or more specifically religion) has not been called pernicious by the like of Richard Dawkins for nothing. I am only roleplaying a nefarious peddler of woo woo.
I know that if I had serious intent and I gathered nefarious but intellectually powerful, knowlegable manipulators of human weaknesses around me that I could create a 'terrible' group that could become powerful and influential just like the Christian or Islamic dictates or at least get as far as groups like Scientology but only because far too many of us feel so lost in their own personal lives.
I am not lost and I just want to try to help those who seem to be so.
I believe that the human race can and will do better and I agree with one point Steven Pinker makes most times he is involved in discussions. He always offers examples of how we have improved compared to the past.
Indeed. They make even more miney from atheism than the woowoo salesman of gods. Instead they offer another woowoo under the so-called objective guise of scientific woowoo. Dawkins books are all based on the dogma of molecular biology... More woowoo it can't get. Life being controlled by selfish genes and memes? Ooookaaaaay!
I posted some of my reasoning for my roleplay in my previous post to this one.
Your point 2 is one of the main human weak points.
Tao, Zen etc they are all fine but we need to pay more attention to the everyday Realpolitik!!
The nefarious genius is probably the most dangerous member of the human race.
The nefarious genius who also has a deep understanding of human psyche is also incredibly dangerous.
Theism can often be a route to power and influence for such.
Politics is another.
Powerful checks and balances at every level of human society is the only defense that could really stop such individuals.
The Ukraine situation must be made as impossible as possible.
The election of nefarious people to power such as Trump, Putin etc must be made as impossible as possible.
Are the Filipino people really going to go through the 'son of Marcos,' sequel? For f*** sake humans!!
Yes, but it will probably be the only group interested. Your theology is incoherent, incomprehensible, completely random, directed to power and money, threatens with a terrible afterlife, morally superior towards other gods, and scientifically dubious, to say the least. In short, a theology like most at the moment. It shows the shortcomings of modern theology (of which Dawkins rightly says that a university degree in it doesn't mean shit!).
All YOU have to do my poor lostboy is join the SCIgodians they will help you much more than your polytheistic gods. :death:
If I now drop my roleplay I would simply say to you, surely! you see how truly nefarious humans operate!
If you think Richard Dawkins is one of the nefarious, then In my opinion you will remain one of the lost boys and you will remain easy meat for the SCIgodians theists or something like them.
The point is, your SCIgod is no god but a real entity in my being already. Science offers no secrets for me. The SCIgod has nothing new to offer and all his knowledge can be punctured. You project the lust of scientific power intk an unrational being with omnipotent features, a feat exposed by people like Dawkins who like science to be all powerful and powerfully instate it as a global culture. I think he would actually like your Scigod! :lol:
I don't personally know the guy, and dont know if he's nefarious. What I do know is that he doesn't llike religion. Which is his good right, but you can't argue against something because you don't like it.
Hah! they could easily make me rich and powerful, they are all I would need for my rise to power and influence!
Quoting Hillary
You miss the point, I have no theology, I am an atheist!
But I could easily manipulate the primal fears and personal frailties of lost men and women and theists if that was my nefarious intention from the days of my youth.
Personal wealth, power and influence at any cost was not, is not and never will be my intent.
But then all truly nefarious b******* would say that wouldn't they!
So how do we prevent such people from gaining power and influence without repeating the mistakes of the French and Russian revolutions as dramatised by Orwell in Animal Farm and 1984 or prevent other dystopian dramatisations, such as Huxley's 'Brave new world,' or H.G Wells and 'The shape of things to come,' etc. Humans still have a lot to improve, we don't need the distractions offered by woo woo BS.
Yez, but the point is, you follow a theology just the same. You have a sense of wonder in walking through the material universe, which makes the universe itself god or something you worship. Especially the so worshipped knowledge gathering, which is just wanting to know god. But how can something so wondrous exist in the first place. A mindless spark seems to render life mindless just the same. Mindless stuff stays mindless, no matter how much you combine of it. Mind is no holistic property od death.
You probably see this as a clever trick to convert you, but that's not gonna happen... I just defend my "theology" or religion from Dawkinskian attack. If the guy knew a bit more physics, he would realize science has no answers, as he thinks. And his silly selfish memes and genes even less! I guess I know it... He's a frustrated physicist, bullied at school and taking revenge!
No, I cant worship that which I am an integrated part of. Does my heart worship my brain?
Do my neurons worship my imagination? The word worship involves deference. The Cosmos is full of wonders that I don't understand but I don't 'worship,' it. I am part of it.
I leave such concepts as worship to insecure theism.
Quoting Hillary
Again you conflate religious labels with scientific pursuits. Knowledge gathering is a natural process of being human, there is no worship involved. Wonder, happiness, frustration, satisfaction yes but not silly labels such as worship. It certainly has nothing to do with knowing that which does not exist.
Quoting Hillary
Well you will find no final contentment in polytheism, if you did you would come across as a much more contented individual rather than one whose wife lovingly considers you a nutter.
Quoting Hillary
:smile: eh.......No.
Quoting Hillary
IMHO, you are losing, and Dawkins et al, are kicking your ass up and down the streets of free-thinking humanity.
Still, you write it with capital c. Now it could be me, but that looks like worshipping, or at least respecting. Like you spell names, Brother Uni. Why can't you worship something you're a part of?
Quoting universeness
Don't tell me knowledge gathering and sacred to you! You even see it as the purpose of being human. But what's so important about Knowledge? It has brought the world at the brink of extinction! You can say humans did that but that's the same as the theistic argument that humans are responsible.
Quoting universeness
Haha, indeed. But still, I find final contentment because they endow the universe with wonder. I know you dont need them fir that, but for me it's different.
Quoting universeness
My paranoia surfaces... :smile:
Quoting universeness
Then it's no free thinking street at all! I just kick back on his pompous ass! "Oooohh, love it! Kick again! On the other side now! A supersymmetric kick, if I only knew what that meant. But it feels good! Do it again!" :lol:
I agree with you, it is just your interpretation. Capitalisation can be used as a mere measure of emphasis with no reference to any aspect of worship at all. For me, the label 'worship' is akin to irrational religious need or a rather obsessive aspect of human love or/and addiction.
Quoting Hillary
What is 'purpose' got to do with 'sacred?' Sacred is another label that relates to the god posit.
It is backward thinking nefarious humans in global positions of power and influence that has brought the human race to the brink of extinction. Those who are xenophobic, territorial, racist, culturalist and mentally imbalanced. I have stated many times that ICBM's don't kill people. They have to be fired at people by other people.
Quoting Hillary
Part of the human experience so far results in a so-called 'winners' and 'losers' system
Economically, that must be utterly smashed, globally and permanently.
You are free to think what you want but you cannot action your imperatives if you have no mandate to do so.
Debate/dialogue/discussion and then I hope, the outcome best suited to the needs of the majority involved. The minority will hopefully not become bitter and twisted due to the imposition of the solution decided upon if they at least have economic freedom.
I think theism will continue to dissipate and will reach a similar token status to the current status of monarchy in the not-to-distant future. Good riddance! That's what I mean by you are losing and will continue to lose on the issue of theism. The most avid speakers that theism can offer, get trounced, in my opinion, every time they publically debate atheists.
Theists are the most fertile at producing atheists because theists speak about why they are theists.
All you have offered is the panto response of 'oh no they are not and oh no they don't.'
Meantime, believers are becoming nonbelievers at an ever-increasing pace. Especially when those who are rather lost in life begin to understand the SCIgodian mirror of their belief system and they are offered adequate secular humanist help in their lives.
And every scientifically literate and philosophically thoughtful person recognizes what an "obviously" nonsensical (i.e. question-begging infinite regression) this question is. :sweat:
The only "ultimate" answer to WHY (this universe, or existence?) which does not beg the question is "obviously" that THERE IS NO WHY. Get over it. :fire:
Aplologies accepted. But not saying anything because of being afraid of an asinus asinum fricat ...
(I let you complete the sentence. Anything will do! :smile:)
:ok: Danke gracious human!
But why should gods be irrational if they offer reason, meaning, or purpose of life? The cosmos can't offer such reason, as science can't explain the very existence of that cosmos. And the aim of science is to rationally explain.
Quoting universeness
Well, you don't use the terms sacred and worship, but in practice that labels are justified.
Quoting universeness
No. It's the application of scientific knowledge which is the cause. You can sing arias about a balanced approach, but in reality the world has been brought in a state it hasn't been in before, because of a way of thinking cooked up a few thousand years ago by a few Greek thinkers, rediscovered in the Enlightenment. In a few hundred years, humanity has managed to turn paradise in a barren, clorless reflection of hezven.
Quoting universeness
Indeed. And I blow mr. Dawkins under the table with a few arguments. His attitude sucks and he is a pityful lost human being, trying to compensate his inferiority complex by cowardly hiding behind science about which he doesn't know shit and by only by his dogmatic thinking he thinks he made a contribution. His books are even worse than the bible, which means they are pretty dogmatic! "I wanna be a good scientist, mummy, All the boys bully me! And by being a good scientist I can take revenge!" I know these kinds of boys. There was one at university like that. He was already scared if I even looked at him! And meanwhile picking on others he thought were even weaker than him! A future Dawkins!.
Quoting universeness
Neither can scientists! But they are in power and even force people by law to absorb their woowoo. You were one of the refined slavedrivers yourself! Don't tell me about mandated enaction! Science has power without it having asked for it!
Quoting universeness
And there are non-believers becoming believers too! Im one of them. Precisely because I know about the fundamentals of modern physics.
If you knew your physics better, or maybe even some basics, you would know better. There is no infinite regress. Only a TD timeless state of the bulk quantum vacuum out of which two universes inflate periodically. I was over this already some time ago.
This, mon ami, is to me a Zen koan that's been vexing me for a long time. I haven't the slightest clue how to process it. Danke for the rude awakening! :grin:
Truth has power as its fundamental quanta. Science searches for truth, theism settles for woo woo!
Quoting Hillary
Then send your monthly subscription to your brothers and sisters, waiting for you here at your nearest SCIgodian branch. We are your true family or at least those who would love to become your family.
We can explain the physics you don't understand. Believe in us and we will save you from your impending self-aware eternal oblivion. The feeling of hunger that persists for eternity but is never sated, the thirst never quenched, the human needs never met. Just you alone, after death, In a dark immortal madness.
All this horror can be avoided and all the enlightenment you will ever need can be achieved at our fabulous bargain introductory price of £34.99.
You know it makes sense. :halo:
You mean your [s]Peter[/s] Hillary Tingle!
But that's up to the people and not for you to decide. And the truth in science of today might be the woowoo of tomorrow. You only have to look at the history of science to conclude that. If some discipline uses woowoo, it's science.
Quoting universeness
I don't need your SCIgod to know physics... The true gods already informed me about the stuff they used.. Sounds very attractive though, and the price is good! Better than the 4 dollar our friend Carroll asks to ask him a question of which you're not even sure of answer! I knew what I would choose for my money! :halo:
I know my phosophy! Phosophy is great fun. Infinite regres in argumentation, for example... Will it ever stop? Infinite, eternal arguing. I sign for it! :lol:
WTF is Hillary Tingle?
Seek and ye shall find! :joke:
Oh! Now I get it! :up:
Can you not distinguish between science that turns out to be wrong and complete woo woo that started off as woo woo and always will be woo woo?
You have invented a space in-between scientific hypotheses, which have been accepted as 'possible' within the scientific community and complete woo woo BS. Is this where your polytheism lives?
Quoting Hillary
If you want to join the SCIgod chosen then don't blaspheme!
SCIgod is physics. You are of the Orga and the Mathaphys.
Respect and live the SCIgodian life or be damned to your existence of eternal unsated wants and needs
Eternal awareness in the dark with no input stimuli forever.
At least in the false christian hell you can hear yourself scream.
We have not yet received your first payment and cannot progress your application until we do!
Of course. But many scientists can't and will stick to the woo woo no matter what.
Quoting universeness
You mean the woo woo of many worlds? No that's not where the gods live. They live outside the universe and comfartably, eeh, comfortably lay back and watch us.
Quoting universeness
All hail to the SCIgod! Love that god! But it can't tell me nothing no more as far as elementary particles, spacetime, dark energy, dark matter, and quantum fields are concerned. But there is much more of course. Ill consider asking him questions for that ridiculously low price. And I don't wanna get lost in the dark eternally!
Quoting universeness
I respect Orga, Mathaphys, and even live the Pscigodian life! What awaits me in that case? Eternal awareness in the light with a lot of input?
Quoting universeness
They can suck my eternal di... oops! :lol:
The Holy Trinity (science)
1. Mathematics
2. Rationality
3. Experiment
Of course! Hillary Tingle!
:lol: Don't tell @Hillary this as I think I can probably get a lifetime subscription out of him for the SCIgodians. I would normally only reveal this to my most trusted upper circle of the SCIgodian leadership structure but SCI has nothing to do with the word science.
It actually stands for Simple Con Idea! :lol:
Quoting universeness
Logical conclusion: physics=simpleconideagod! Forget your money! :lol:
SUBTOPIC: Sound and Valid Outcomes
?? Hillary, et al,
An exploded view of gods, how you imagine that?[/reply]
(COMMENT)
An "Exploded View" of any supernatural entity is an image of the respective components of that entity. If you are defining the attributes of a Supreme Being, the components bundled like omnipotence, omniscient, omnipresent, immortal, and preeminence, as the key components that must be assembled for the entity to be The Supreme Being. In the case of a Supreme Being having dominion over lesser deities, the exploded view would also demonstrate the relative strengths of the particular entity. The God of War might be the most powerful (second only to the Supreme Being) but greater than all other deities in that regard. However, the Goddess of Love would have more influence in that quality than the God of War; etc, etc, etc.
Why has the uncertainty principle offer a perspective on a proof that has greater probability? Do you mean a greater probability being true than the gods being true,?[/reply]
(COMMENT)
With the Uncertainty Principle, you may be able to attribute a given event to a God Like Power being used, but not know which God was exercising that power.
With the Principle of Sufficient Reason (PSR), you might be able to discern the likelihood of the power behind the event, but not know for sure. The Greek God Aeolus's primary power was dominion over the winds. However, the Greek God Poseidon had dominion over the seas. Strong winds over the ocean may create storm-tossed seas. The PSR might deduce a storm to one or the other. But might not know for sure.
Both the PSR and the Uncertainty Principle have an element of probability associated with it.
Most Respectfully,
R
Humans are flexible in their beliefs : If it "works", it doesn't matter if it's real. For example, the number "Zero" refers to that which does not exist. But the gap-filler symbol (0) of emptiness has been found to be very useful in higher math (higher than fingers & toes). Likewise, imaginary numbers are non-existent in any physical sense, yet again ivory tower mathematicians find them to be necessary or inevitable for their abstract purposes. Even Potential, as defined by Aristotle, is non-existent but powerful. Imagine the power of un-actualized Omnipotential.
Terrence Deacon has coined a new term for non-existence. He uses "absence" & "absential" to refer to a state that has not-yet been realized or actualized. It is especially apt for describing human intentions. His definition of causal non-existence does not specifically refer to a god, but you can see the resemblance in a deity who exists in some sense, but is not physically there or anywhere.
Causal Absence also has physical implications in "strange attractors" of chaos & fractals, and for the "great attractor" out in the cosmos, yet there is nothing there. Even the physical notion of Entropy seems to be pointing to a state of nothingness in the future, toward which all things in the world seem to be "pulled". Are non-existent strings attached to such sink-holes in reality? :wink:
Constitutive absence: A particular and precise missing something that is a critical defining attribute of 'ententional' phenomena, such as functions, thoughts, adaptations, purposes, and subjective experiences.
http://absence.github.io/3-explanations/absential/absential.html
Oop! :blush:
But those few scientists that are in that category, remain at the fringe or are even ridiculed by the main scientific community.
In the vast majority of those cases, the science community is correct but sometimes they are wrong and when that happens, we normally have a very welcome breakthrough and a complete change of direction and focus. All hail the very very very rare scientist whose idea seemed like looney tunes but actually proved to be correct.
Quoting Hillary
The multiverse theory is not woo woo, it has many advocates amongst established cosmologists.
I am not a fake news peddler, I don't ignore those who are established experts in their field because some individuals or groups of malcontents in society, advise me to.
Quoting Hillary
Quoting Hillary
Careful sinner! Lest you shall reap the whirlwind and be damned by your own utterances.
Quoting Hillary
No cash no cure! You think SCIgod is a charity? What level of salvation in the afterlife can you afford?
Abandon all hope. Utter darkness has no meaning of its own. It is hungry for your eternally aware presence. Your damnation and the damnation of your like, will sate its hunger.
One special introductory offer of £34.99 will rise to £55.99 next month.
Choose wisely Mr Physics man :death:
:rage: :broken: Who told you such lies?????
Of Course, SCI is short for science. I hope it wasn't that fallen exSCIgodian @Agent Smith who told you this totally FAKE BS that I typed that SCI stood for Simple Con Idea.
He just makes stuff up! Our lawyers are going to sue him.
Join us brother. Join our happy family. :halo:
Do you therefore agree, that all human thought, projects conceptualisations and interpretations upon what we individually experience since birth? We then rely on others to support/confirm/deny/correct our personal concepts and interpretations.
Intelligent humans will employ our best tool, the scientific method, to try to prove that any popular concept or interpretation is correct or wrong based on empirical evidence and, they will assess, how strong the evidence is.
If empirical evidence cannot be found in support of a concept, then it is at worse, completely rejected, or at best, it is held to the sides, until more knowledge is discovered.
Any causal reference to the god posit as an original source for the Universe has so far, had no evidential support AT ALL except ancient and modern hearsay and the wishful thinking of humans who are simply terrified because they don't know why they are and they fear oblivion after death because they think they may be in some way, still aware of time passing.
The fact that they had no existence for the majority of the past 13.8 billion years does not comfort them.
They need god as their savior because the idea of it not existing simply terrifies them.
Combatting such raw irrational terror is so difficult that I think some theism will always exist amongst humans. I am not so worried about that. I just want to vastly dilute theistic power within human society so that inducing individual humans to commit acts of war or violence or terror on others due to any theistic doctrine becomes as impossible to achieve as possible.
Which means the majority sold woowoo.
Quoting universeness
Which makes the woowoo even worse!
Quoting universeness
Let that wind come! I'll reap it!
Quoting universeness
I do, I do, brother Uni! :death:
Brother Uni! Even in the face of clear evidence to the contrary you stick to the lie! Forget my subscription! You made it very clear though how many religions function. But there are such examples in the scientific religion just the same.
Objection, objection, your honor! Brother Uni The gods posit might have no evidence in his interpretation of evidence, but that evidence is highly contaminated. We all know science tries to grasp the source of the material just as the gods posit tries. But if the gods posit is posited after the scientific attempt has proven useless, inadequate, meaningless, without reason, and improvable just the same, the posit is justified.
A defeatist viewpoint! We cant answer the big questions yet after much effort so let's just surrender to the woo woo god posit. No way! Pascals Wager is surrender at best and absolute cowardice at worse.
The point is, I can answer that question. And the gods even helped me answering it! Pascal wagered, I am sure!
Everyone can provide an answer if they choose to. Even the animals can grunt or squeak or quack an answer. That doesn't give such answers any inherent value. Proof boy proof or you are just screaming words into a void where sound doesn't travel. Your answer is more than likely, nowhere near the correct answer. Just like the answers offered by all pernicious theism, including the SCIgodians.
The proof is a cosmological model. A 4d (7d) eternal infinite quantum vacuum on which 3d (6d) real space and TD time emerge periodically. A serial big inflation. In every new big bang, the gods can witness a new and different temporay version of eternal heavenly life. They weren't quite as stupid as you might guess!
Infinite afterlives!
Give me one then!
I already have, many times. A ToE based on String theory/Mtheory and the first cause was a mindless, meaningless spark that no longer has any existence. This is much more likely for me than your 6D manifold and god(s).
Why the ToE of strings is more likely? If you understand it, it offers no clue to dark energy. String theory is a fantasy even worse than gods. Not to speak of a mindless spark. Where the hell did a mindless spark came from?
More time is required to complete!
Quoting Hillary
Says you, from the distant fringes of the scientific community.
Quoting Hillary
From nowhere! Same as your fictitious god(s)
There you go again! "Once upon a time in a future, far far away." If the basics are out of touch with reality, it will drift off more and more. Many scientists consider it a dead end street. No wonder, as it arose in the context of the strong interaction.
The real stuff happens in the fringes. The modal scientists just repeat the string woowoo. They have no real genius! Majority is no indication of truth. Mass hallucination!
Gods didn't appear from nowhere. It takes gods to let the mindless spark come into existence from nowhere. That's the power of creation. And science can't explain that! Which is with which you are struggling. "How can gods create?" The mindless spark is the 4d (7d to fit 6d particles) hyperstructure.
Or maybe tomorrow!
Quoting Hillary
True, but many others dont!
Quoting Hillary
Yeah, but only in the opinion of those ON the fringes!
Quoting Hillary
It could be worse, they could be trying to find common ground between Cosmology and polytheism!
Quoting Hillary
No, that's just what you need to be so.
I experience no such struggle. I love the search, I don't need to settle for a lazy woo woo fantasy.
I want the fact that humans still have questions to last as long as there are humans or transhumans in existence. Happy days ahead! A better future for all lifeforms! That's the main goal.
God is an unnecessary nonexistent pile of quicksand!
If you still need it then the SCIgodians await you!
It is highly unlikely the mindless spark had anything to do with this Universe, Don't forget the physics of the Penrose bounce!
Actually, already some time ago. But not strings!
Quoting universeness
But an increasing number does!
Quoting universeness
Of course. It's not an opinion though.
Quoting universeness
The common ground between these is a matter of temporally material. The cosmos and life in it are a material temporal copy of non-physical heaven and eternal life in it. So, know the universe and you know heaven. Know life and you know the gods. People have messed it up though. Because the apple of science was firmly bitten.
Quoting universeness
It's an unconscious primal fear...
So, exactly what I suggested.....woo woo.
Quoting Hillary
Yeah, so unconscious, I have never experienced it. :lol:
Your gods remain powerless fantasies who can't even touch me!
False gods...
Quoting universeness
It preceded the big bangs, or not? What's the nature of the spark. Is it a tunneling chance of 10exp(10exp(10exp(10exp50)))?
Right! A mindless spark appearing from nothing isn't woowoo... It's even bigger woowoo, irrational, without reason. How can that happen?
So you are very familiar with them then!
Quoting Hillary
Don't know, it was too long ago, in a time before time in this Universe. It has no significance AT ALL.
But it inspires your thinking without you knowing it. Subliminal!
I'm glad you finally agree that positing a first cause is irrational and always will be.
Very scientific, your mindless spark!
If the cause gives reason, it's the most rational it can get. Ratio=reason.
No, you are as far away as the first cause is with that conclusion!
So just like your gods then!
Believe, brother Uni, it's your unconscious primal fear! Try to proof it's not...
But it doesn't, its the same as obsessing about what the biggest or smallest number is, its a pointless waste of brain effort.
The difference being that I don't pretend them to be scientific. It's precisely because science fails I posit them. Your play!
The SCIgodians are waiting for your subscription. You will find solace there!
Your surrender to woo woo has been the foundation of our disagreement!
It gives a reason why the universe is there and all life in it.
Ah! Now I got it! You don't like surrendering!
No it offers nothing but false woo woo BS that you have surrendered your rationality to when your science screams at you from your other shoulder. "Aw for f*** sake Hillary, you are a thinker not a tinkerer with woo woo."
No, I don't and I don't like that fact a good scientific thinker like you can. It offends my humanism!
How can gods having a reason for creation not provide a reason? Woowoo reason is reason!
You think I surrender to them? No way! To nobody!
999!
Defeatist surrender to woo woo! The easy way out because physics befuddles you even with your impressive knowledge of it. The pressure of the search has defeated you. You have laid down and screamed for mercy and the woo woo has offered itself to you as an escape from the challenge of rational human thinking. The SCIgodian leaders can now use you to help them become rich!
It befuddles me because I'm impressed the gods could have come up with such ingenuity! Try to let that appear from a mindless spark.
YES YOU HAVE UTTERLY SURRENDERED TO THEM!
The woo woo BS has made you insult the best most productive most useful thinking you have ever done, PHYSICS! It didnt love you back enough so you ran backwards towards the poly wolly doodle BS of theism for some relief from your own pressurised rational.
Other good thinkers did the same, Tesla fell in love with a pigeon for f*** sake!
You wanted to drink from car exhausts. Put the pieces together humpty dumpty!
And they even endowed it with heavenly magic! Fuck the scigodian leaders! Follow your dream, and you'll go far! Every man and woman is a star!
They exist, but I haven't surrendered to them! Why should I?
Quoting universeness
??
The gods helped me! Why should the woowoo insult physics?
Now you're talking! We are made of starstuff! We can do better and we will.
Nefarious b******* beware. You have stolen the cream for too long, we are beginning to see through all of your clever tricks. We now know it's not about becoming individually rich and powerful or becoming a celebrity. I don't care if I die alone, in pain, and forgotten in a sewer. I will still pursue truth and speak truth to power. I dare the nonexistent gods to face me after my death, I will rip their pathetic heaven and hell apart and start a revolution that will destroy their totalitarian omnipotent asses!
He fell in love with a pigeon? :lol:
I was psychotic... Time hadnt moved 100 years in the future, and the monthly air alarm exercise didn't announce the new age!
Eeehhh... shit forgot Scottish!
No, your psyche just offered you an easier way out, that's all.
Deep thinking about the physics of the Universe and its origin story has sent many good thinkers slightly mad. But most will still not surrender to BS like polytheism. You insult your own power of rational thought because the price can be a mental war inside your own head. Some scientists spend every waking moment of their lives trying to struggle with the big questions. This struggle is far more impressive that any fight invented in heaven stories. From the trials of Hercules through to the biblical Sampson, goliath etc etc. Even Jesus and his troops at armageddon is an easier fight than a single puny human brain trying to figure out the mysteries of the Universe. You should take strength in your physics quests not buckle under the enormous pressure and surrender to f****** woo woo! :rage:
Might be, but I have finally found an answer to the physics of the physical fundaments. I dreamt about it and now it's real! There is no easy way I choose. That would be ignoring the gods. Only gods can explain the miracle and reason of existence. Why there is such a fundamental reality in the first place. I dont use gods to explain the working, only for why there are workings in the first place. :starstruck:
That's why we all need support sometimes. Medical science has not been stagnant. People can get help when they temporarily fall down.
Quoting Hillary
Keep thinking as you walk your dog. You don't need polytheistic BS, you need to respect and offer yourself, all that you are, to science and physics as that is where you truly exist!
You still need family, friends, and experiences outside of science of course but stop your dancing to polytheistic tunes.
Don't let the SCIgodians get their BS claws into you any deeper than the penetration your theistic dalliances have already caused.
No, nobody's claws get into me. Believe you that. The thing is that the woowoo gods story gives me a great feeling and makes me see the wonder of creation. Science alone is not enough for me. And now dear brother Uni, I have to walk with Belle bitch Bo. A lovely goddess... woef woef! :grin: