Chuck Phipps

My personal belief is that we are here to do the one thing that is difficult for God to do. That is to grow a soul, whatever a soul truly is. Here is my reasoning. According to Genesis, God made everything in five days, with the exception of Mankind. I don't believe that those are literally five rotations of the Earth, but five of God's "work days". On the sixth day, He only did one thing; make Man in His image. That does not mean two arms, two legs, one head, etc. It means He made us like Him; spiritually. In essence, he gave the animal man a soul. That transformed man into Man. Then He rested. That implies that giving Man a soul was as hard as making the rest of the universe. Why did He do this? He, like the rest of us, wanted to grow. In order to grow, He needed to add to His current soul. Through the trials and tribulations of living, our soul grows. As we fight and remain strong and faithful, regardless of how harsh our life becomes, our soul grows. As we help our fellow man overcome their problems, even as our own problems pull us down, our soul grows. That is why God isn't Santa Claus; giving us anything we want, or even need. You don't grow without some sort of adversity. If you can get through life without becoming bitter and resentful, they your soul is good and strong. When you die, the only thing left of YOU is your soul and that soul will join with God and make Him a little greater than He was. You have fulfilled your purpose.

Sorry for the quick replay and the time to get back with some more about your reply. I was participating in our town's Memorial Day service. I think we are getting sidetracked by our definitions of feedback. I'm no scientist (as if that wasn't clear), but even your last comment about tilt and albedo doesn't have any of what I would call active feedback. The tilt is the tilt and while it does change over long periods of time, it cannot be adjusted in reaction to any conditions. The albedo, while it can change due to environmental conditions such as snow in the winter reflecting more radiation, doesn't necessarily counter the temperature. Quite the opposite, in the example I have given. My only reason for giving my views in the first place was that most of the discussions I have seen have centered on the levels of greenhouse gases and their causes. When I then hear predictions as precise as a half of a degree rise in a hundred years based on the physics of the atmosphere, I tend to lean more skeptical; not of the science behind the predictions but by the lack of mention of mitigating or unknown factors that could offset these predictions, such as the adaptation of life, perhaps even microbial life, that could change everything. I have to go now, but I do appreciate that more informed people are taking the time to respond. ps. I hope I didn't ramble too much. It was hot and humid out there and my brain might have been baked a bit.

Thanks for the comment. In retrospect, "active feedback" is probably a redundant expression. A regulating feedback is by its nature "active". I work at a company that makes ovens; the big ones for Oscar Mayer, Swift, Conagra, etc. In order to maintain a constant temperature and humidity, those attributes are constantly checked and the heat source and ventilation is adjusted as necessary. Without that ability, there would be no stability. The same must somehow be true of the Earth, too, or it wouldn't be stable, either. I'm sure that this is all taken into account by real climate scientists, but I never hear that part of the model mentioned.

It does, doesn't it. I've heard of Gaia as a name for Earth, but didn't know it was a hypothesis so close to my own view. Thanks.

Given: 1. The actual planet Earth; the rock in space, doesn't care at all what temperature it is. 2. Over the last 10,000 years or so, the average temperature of the surface of the Earth has varied less than 2°C. Quite a bit less, in fact. Current assumptions: 1. The atmosphere; its composition, specifically, is the main player in determining global heating/cooling trends. Add more greenhouse gases and the temperature rises. Lower the concentration and the temperature will fall. 2. Man is currently the most responsible for the increase in these gases. Observation: 1. We have had a remarkably stable average temperature over the eons, even when Man arguably had no effect at all on anything. 2. That degree (pardon the pun) of consistency requires some form of active feedback to be in operation. Posit: I suggest that the Life itself of our planet is that active feedback. I believe that there are some forms of life on the planet that thrive in colder conditions and some forms that thrive in warmer ones. Those that do better in the cold will have some form of emission or characteristic that will lead to rising temperatures over the long haul and those that do well in the warmth will have the opposite effect. It might be their very color, which in abundance would perhaps change the albedo of a significant enough area to reduce or enhance cumulative solar radiation. Perhaps they directly emit or consume greenhouse gases in greater quantities, depending on the circumstances. It could be anything. The point is that most of the models I have seen seem to think that the physics of the atmosphere are the whole story. There is no feedback from the atmosphere to account for the steadiness of the temperature. Life, on the other hand, can change slowly, but drastically in the epochal time frames necessary to regulate our planet. Of course I could be wrong. Any comments?