Can you mix science with god?

[Iggy]

Iggy,

 

The bovines in the neighborhood are safe from me. (except that really cute one)

 

Ha! That was good. You had me laughing with that

 

I did have point with that post, but it is obviously more an opinion than a fact. But that oddly enough, was one of the points I was trying to make. There are many things about human life, that are basically consensus opinions. The law, morality, traditions, and stories and promises of all sorts.

 

I tend to obsess on things, I get an idea and overthink the darn thing, and feed it through every ringer I can think of, and look at it from any and all perspectives I can manage. Such is my rut, that Phi for All helped put me in, over in his faith thread, started by his OP that equated faith with an over-reaction required by the need to believe something was true, BECAUSE it absolutely was not true, and only by digging yourself deeper into fantasy land, could you manage to bolster your belief.

 

I don't know that Phi has it right. I think there is something more, involved in "faith". And the faith we have in each other (not math and quarks) but each other, is akin to the faith that people have in God. And it bears on this thread strongly because neither science or faith, has anyplace, or anything other than reality, to be basing itself on, in the sense, that whatever truely is the case, about the universe...is the case about the universe, regardless of our opinion or judgments on the matter, BUT the only things we can really experience, or know, or care about, concerning reality are the things about it that matter to us.

 

So I carry the rut over into this thread, and try and suggest that God and science mix, because the majority of the human race, keep both sets of books. And there most likely is a good reason that we do. Those reasons are what I care to explain to myself. To illuminate my own understanding.

 

It is more opinion than fact that I am going on about. But sometimes science takes a Godlike perspective on things, and everybody knows what taking a Godlike perspective might mean. As if having such a perspective is a real possibility, or that it should mean anything to anybody. (as in Prof. Krauss being the first to know, how the universe ends.) (don't you think he is "pretending" a little, to take such a perspective, and consider it "true") (true to who?).

 

 

Regards, TAR2

 

Or to call Andromeda a member of the "local" cluster, when it is exactly NOT local in any real sense of the word local. It is rather the opposite of local. Except in our imaginations where we can take a grain size and manipulate it scalewise, immediately and at will, with no actual sense required. We don't have to add everything back, and make it fit, to imagine it "true". Sort of like belief in god. Just a thought.

 

But a thought about reality.

 

I suppose my underlying point, is a challenge to the Humanist. (which I may be one)

How can you have faith in your fellow man, if you think that faith is crap?

 

Immortal,

 

Making hissing and popping sounds with your mouth does not make the disc of the Sun expand. Not really.

 

Regards, TAR2

 

I... eh... yeah....

 

Parra Pa! Pa! Pa!

 

Sorry, there's a Brazilian song running through my head. I challenge anyone to figure out what it is

 

So, I gather you were in another thread with a mate called Phi where some things were agreed upon. That's great. I wasn't there. And... it looks like... you can't distinguish between faith in a solid human being who interacts with you, and faith in an imaginary being. That's fine, but honestly... the background song running through the back of my mind was a little more interesting.

 

I ask you to affirm your atheism, and... I just with you'd plant a flag there. Argue from it.

[tar]

Iggy,

 

Well I would argue that interaction with other humans is all we do...if it were not for the rest of reality.

And I would argue that interaction with real, existing things is all we could possibly do, if it was not for imagination.

 

When I was young, there was no internet. We thought it up, and made it real.

A mere thousand years ago, there was no border between Canada and the U.S. There were not even the two countries to have a border between. We thought the situation up, and made it real. Human interaction, by human interaction.

 

Religious freedom, was one of the drivers of Europeans to the new world. How one was to interact with the world, was not to be dictated by the "powers that be" in Europe.

 

What does "yearning to be free" mean? Free from what? Tyranny and oppression, most likely. But those things come in all sizes, and are normally "thought up" by the same humans we interact with, and count on to help us survive.

 

My argument as an atheist would be that there is no one entity, like a human, running the whole show. There cannot be such. Humans only came about "recently" on one small planet, that we know about.

 

But there remains the question of what are humans like. What is it that we are made of, and reflect? What is it that we copy? What is it that we are in and of? We did NOT make that up, and must be formed in its image, in some sense or manner.

 

If science is our attempt to learn about the world, and God is our "image" of it, preexisting as a "known" thing, from which we are born, and to which we will return, then not only do science and God mix, but they interact with each other, quite regularly.

 

Regards, TAR2

[zapatos]

Parra Pa! Pa! Pa!

Sorry, there's a Brazilian song running through my head. I challenge anyone to figure out what it is

[immortal]

Wigner is dead. Nothing which he ever said will detract from the fact that the mind is in he brain..

 

Wigner might be dead but his friend his alive to prove you wrong. Even Einstein was not alive to see that he was wrong about QM and Wigner is not here to see the triumph of his theories.

 

“[The reduction of the wave packet] takes place whenever the result of an observation enters the consciousness of the observer – or, to be even more painfully precise, my consciousness, since I am the only observer, all other people being only subjects of my observations. … The measurement is not completed until its result enters our consciousness. This last step occurs when a correlation is established between the state of the last measuring apparatus and something which directly affects our consciousness. This last step is, at the present state of our knowledge, shrouded in mystery and no explanation has been given for it so far in terms of quantum mechanics, or in terms of any other theory.”

"If one observer describes another observer who observes something like a von Neumann chain and if the first observer describes this whole process in the terminology of quantum mechanics, he will end up with ascribing a superposition of different states of consciousness to the second observer. Wigner avoids this paradox by maintaining that quantum theory does not apply to consciousness so that there are no superpositions of different states of consciousness. A state reduction occurs at the level of the friend’s consciousness."

- Wigner

Consciousness is non-material and substance dualism is true and a Nous exists separate from the brain.

“Plato’s ideas do not belong to space-time but they exist independently of the human mind and are the cause of phenomena. This is why, when we talk of Plato, we sometimes talk of the realism of essences. In this sense (a distant independent reality, probably not situated in time and space-time), it is difficult for the philosophical realism of a physicist to avoid being a little bit Platonist. Bohm himself, previously a standard bearer of the “materialist” physicists, even says now that perceived objects are only projections of what exists.”

- Bernard D'Espagnat

Gee, Bernard knows the simple fact which Penrose, a proponent of Platonism doesn't know, the fact that Plato's ideas do not belong to space-time but they exist independently of the human mind and are the cause of the phenomena. When I said the same thing based on my studies on pagan mystery religions no one is willing to believe, anyone who has studied the pagan mystery religions knows that Plato's ideas do not belong to space-time and hence if Penrose thinks that the foundations of mathematics cannot be understood absent the Platonic view and if he says that he is sympathetic to the Platonic view that mathematical objects have an eternal existence on its own separate from humans then why the heck he is trying to distort Platonism and searching for Platonic values in the microtubules of the brain. A simple truth which no one see it.

And our ancients figured out this 5000 years ago.

The Veiled Reality of Bernard is in support of our religion and you might not consider the great philosophical traditions of the east however we are not blind and we can see the truth and we will continue to investigate it. Its the death of scientific realism as we say.

Drik Drishya Viveka - The correct discrimination between the Seer(Drik) and the Seen(Drishya), the observer and the observed.

An inquiry into the nature of the Seer and the Seen.

Again I ask which one of your oral traditions of tooth fairy, FSM etc figured out this esoteric secrets 5000 years ago? There is none more deluded than the persons who equate God with FSM, a false analogy.

You guys have underestimated religion and no matter how many times I say this you guys will never accept these facts of nature and its because you guys are deluded. As far as I am concerned I have no conflicts between science and religion, my religion and science are saying the same thing and religion deals with the noumenon and science deals with the phenomena and there is no conflict between science and religion, even though one cannot epistemologically mix both science and religion they have indeed converged. The atheists and people of orthodox religions can quarrel with each other all they want, I for though have no conflict between science and religion.

I figured out this with my studies on both modern physics, molecular neurobiology as well as the pagan mystery religions and you guys don't know how deep the rabbit hole actually goes. This was just a small truth.

as proved by the effect of drugs on the mind when they are present in the brain or that brain damage often affects the mind.

 

It doesn't rule out the possibility that we are actually in an immersive virtual reality, the external mind could easily make this empirical reality look real and hence it doesn't prove anything.

Edited March 13, 2013 by immortal

[John Cuthber]

"takes place whenever the result of an observation enters the consciousness of the observer"

Wigner was unable to evince that, it was an opinion, not a fact.

 

"You guys have underestimated religion and no matter how many times I say this you guys will never accept these facts of nature and its because you guys are deluded."

No, we don't accept them because, like Santa Claus and the Tooth fairy, there is no actual evidence for them.

Writing it in another alphabet doesn't make it evidence.

 

"It doesn't rule out the possibility that we are actually in an immersive virtual reality, the external mind could easily make this empirical reality look real and hence it doesn't prove anything."

It doesn't rule out the possibility that there are fairies at the bottom of my garden, but it would be pretty stupid for me to believe in them too.

[immortal]

"takes place whenever the result of an observation enters the consciousness of the observer"

Wigner was unable to evince that, it was an opinion, not a fact.

 

A non-linear collapse of the wavefunction happens exactly when a conscious being enters the picture which is in contradictory to the linear evolution of the Schroedinger's wavefunction and this non-linear process is still a mystery and that's a fact not a opinion.

 

"You guys have underestimated religion and no matter how many times I say this you guys will never accept these facts of nature and its because you guys are deluded."

No, we don't accept them because, like Santa Claus and the Tooth fairy, there is no actual evidence for them.

Writing it in another alphabet doesn't make it evidence.

 

Of course the alphabets matters, it proves that a tradition worshipping a God had figured out the truth about this universe 5000 years ago which modern science has barely scratched the surface and has affirmed that these traditions were right about their claims in this 21st century world and might go on to give insights to science and it is neurobiologists who have collaborated with Tibetan Buddhists to unravel the mystery of consciousness and religion is already correcting science which some of them here have arrogantly term them goat herders openly showing their ignorance, no one laughs at them more than we do.

 

"It doesn't rule out the possibility that we are actually in an immersive virtual reality, the external mind could easily make this empirical reality look real and hence it doesn't prove anything."

It doesn't rule out the possibility that there are fairies at the bottom of my garden, but it would be pretty stupid for me to believe in them too.

 

Yet one can easily see that my theory is supported by facts established from experiments, scholarly evidence, arguments from mathematicians, psychology etc and the latter theory of fairies is made up bullshit nonsense. One can easily see who is deluded, I rest my case here.

[ydoaPs]

A non-linear collapse of the wavefunction happens exactly when a conscious being enters the picture which is in contradictory to the linear evolution of the Schroedinger's wavefunction and this non-linear process is still a mystery and that's a fact not a opinion.

Wrong. Consciousness doesn't play any role. ANY INTERACTION collapses the wavefunction.

[immortal]

Wrong. Consciousness doesn't play any role. ANY INTERACTION collapses the wavefunction.

 

Nope, even when all the environmental interactions and decoherence is taken into account the measurement problem cannot be avoided and it is inescapable.

 

A General argument against the universal validity of the superposition principle.

 

 

"As we have already mentioned, in this paper we will consider a completely general and realistic model for the measurement process, and we will show that superpositions of different macroscopic configurations of macro–objects cannot be avoided within a strict quantum mechanical scheme. Correspondingly, the appearence of macroscopic situations which are incompatible with our definite perceptions about the objects of our experience is inescapable. This “empasse” can only be eliminated either by adopting a precise and unambiguous interpretation which differs from the orthodox one, or by modifying the theory itself."

Either the wavefunction is not all there is or the wavefunction is incorrect.

[ydoaPs]

Nope, even when all the environmental interactions and decoherence is taken into account the measurement problem cannot be avoided and it is inescapable.

 

A General argument against the universal validity of the superposition principle.

 

 

"As we have already mentioned, in this paper we will consider a completely general and realistic model for the measurement process, and we will show that superpositions of different macroscopic configurations of macro–objects cannot be avoided within a strict quantum mechanical scheme. Correspondingly, the appearence of macroscopic situations which are incompatible with our definite perceptions about the objects of our experience is inescapable. This “empasse” can only be eliminated either by adopting a precise and unambiguous interpretation which differs from the orthodox one, or by modifying the theory itself."

 

Either the wavefunction is not all there is or the wavefunction is incorrect.

1) a 13 year old paper which never got published is hardly worth bringing up

2) having actually read the paper, nothing in it suggests that consciousness plays any role in wavefunction collapse

[John Cuthber]

"Of course the alphabets matters, it proves that a tradition worshipping a God had figured out the truth about this universe 5000 years ago"

No, that proves it's old, not that it's right.

Even longer ago they thought the earth was flat: doe that belief become any more correct when I tell you it's a very old belief?

[immortal]

1) a 13 year old paper which never got published is hardly worth bringing up

 

A simple google search reveals that it was published.

 

http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0375960100006125

 

2) having actually read the paper, nothing in it suggests that consciousness plays any role in wavefunction collapse

 

That paper was not cited to offer support for the view that consciousness plays a role in wavefunction collapse, it was cited to refute your claim that any environmental decoherence collapses the wavefunction.

[Iggy]

 

That's the guys.

 

Man, you pulled that out quick. I should find some more obscure references.

 

You know... it's funny... They are going to have the olimpics in a couple years! It's true... every word of that song is true... the neighborhoods are impossible to get into even for the police. I've been there. You can't get around without 20 guys with AK47s. I can tell you... these people in Rio are hardcore. They will set you alight just to make the hello you giggle at them sound slightly more interesting. But, in a couple years time there's going to be Canadians wandering the outskirts of Rio wondering just how they can get themselves out alive. It's going to make for great news. I can't wait.

 

But, I'm again way off topic. PM me. We'll get on about my close encounters with Brazilian violence like nobody's business.... it will nearly match my stories about Columbia.

 

Iggy,

 

No I didn't realize I was quoting anyone in particular, just using the feet on the ground thing so that my tightrope was laying on it , and I could survive the fall easily, and still have my head in the clouds.

 

Sorry about the cow thing, I guess I milked that metaphor dry.

 

Still would like to know if you have any faith in the whispy stuff that clouds are made of.

 

At the danger of looking like I am arguing for a god that I have already soundly dismissed, I will however probably continue on the abiguity and equivocation route, because I basically am after "what we mean" by god, not "is there a god".

 

I take this route, because it seems a sensible one. No one of us is in the others head. We do not know the subtle differences between our analogies and pattern matchings that make us think the other is missing something important and true.

 

I have long seen an "issue" caused by "the literal" and "the figurative", and what we each think the other is taking in the opposite way than it "should" be taken. On the one hand, the figurative and the literal are easily told apart...but none of us, is convinced that the other could possibly have the same discernment we are capable of...except when we realize that others truely do think and feel in very similar ways, about very similar things. We have no proof or material evidence of this, of course, but there is a lot of circumstancetial (I'll spell that later) evidence that we think and feel alike. We all had moms and dads, many of us siblings, aunts and uncles and cousins, grandparents and so on. We all live in huts or houses or apartments with doors and windows funiture, tvs and computers and such (a lot of us, anyway). Most of us have friends and a way to make a living, or somebody to beg off of. We all get hungry, thirsty, dirty, smelly, and have to go to the bathroom. We all go the the bathroom, or the kitchen to take care of those things. Most of us have two arms, ears, hands, feet, nostrils, eyeballs, legs, cheeks and such, put together in almost exactly the same configuration, with the same senses and motor control working together, guided by very similarly arranged brains. The capabilities any one of us have to sense and remember, feel and predict, plan and act, are not unique to us, individually. However, we exist, in an of a universe that there is only one instance of. In a local cluster of galaxies that is only one cluster of many. but is the only cluster any of us on Earth would call ours. Similarly we all have the same galaxy, the same solar system, and the same Earth. Thus there are things that are solely ours for real, and there are things that are ours figuratively. And the definitions of what is figuratively and/or literally ours, changes with who and what you are including in your definition of self.

 

There are many recipes for how a particular personality can put him/herself together, with this large list of ingredients, some material, some metaphor, some imaginary, some symbolic or analog. And it is difficult for any one of us to get a good taste of what it is, even our spouse, or closest friend, or parent or sibling has cooked up, much less understand the masterpeice put together by an individual at the other keyboard, or building a life on the other side of town, or in another region of the country, or at the other end of the continent or the other side of the world.

 

Yet, we have a clue. We have a feeling, that there is a way we ought to be. To make the others we care about, proud. That we are not alone, and we owe something to somebody or something. And somebody, or something, other than us, cares as well.

 

Our world is very big, and very old, and there are billions of wills on this planet. Each with a vision, of how it ought to be, but each as well with the ability to make it, a little more like that, than it was before. And if this is the case now, as it was yesterday, and the week and year and decade and century and millenium ago, then logic would demand, that we are standing on the shoulders of the people that came before us, and are arm in arm with the people around us. That efforts have been made, ideas turned to reality, inventions and good ideas built on the inventions and good ideas that came before.

 

If one man was alone on this earth, he would be naked and cold and hungry and nothing more than prey to the lions and bears and dogs and boars, snakes and vultures, and open to the elements of cold and wind and water and ice, and subject to infection and disease. He would have to team up with someone, or something. Make some promises, form some pacts, learn from that and those around him, as to how to survive, who and what to align oneself with, and who or what to kill and eat.

 

All in all, I think we have done a good job of working together and taking charge of this place. Technology passed down from generation to generation, and spread between tribes by purchase or robbery or barter or force or simply by observation and copying of that which worked, was certainly one side of the coin. But on the other side of the coin is our feeling of a common connection to all that real stuff, that we are commonly connected to, that we would be nothing and nowhere without.

 

I am not sure there is a normative morality that can be constructed in a purely positivistic way. I am thinking we are subject to the collective consciousness of objective reality, which includes mostly other sentient beings, but also includes some inanimate stuff, like hurricaines and earthquakes and meteors and such, to say nothing of the strong influence of the Sun and its energy, and the Earth and its minerals and gravity, and the air that we breath and the water we drink.

 

When we think of the way it ought to be, we really are about 99 percent there already. And science is only the half of it. The other half, has been in play, and is likely to stay in play, and I really don't think we could or should, do without it.

 

I think the proof that science and God mix, is that they already have.

 

Regards, TAR2

 

Tar or Tar2?

 

What shall I call you?

 

Atheist or pantheist saying "My argument as an atheist would be that there is no one entity, like a human, running the whole show". I can't make heads or tails. That sounded to me like you're a greek arguing for a pantheism of gods. It doesn't look atheist to me. I can't make heads or tails.

Edited March 14, 2013 by Iggy

[immortal]

"Of course the alphabets matters, it proves that a tradition worshipping a God had figured out the truth about this universe 5000 years ago"

No, that proves it's old, not that it's right.

 

No, science has affirmed that its right.

 

Even longer ago they thought the earth was flat: doe that belief become any more correct when I tell you it's a very old belief?

 

That's an old myth, people in the educated masses both religious and non-religious knew that the earth was spherical. What happened to Galileo was unfortunate.

 

"Christopher Columbus's efforts to obtain support for his voyages were not hampered by a European belief in a flat Earth. Sailors and navigators of the time knew that the Earth was roughly spherical, but (correctly) disagreed with Columbus's estimate of the distance to India, which was approximately one-sixth of the actual distance. If the Americas did not exist, and had Columbus continued to India, he would have run out of supplies before reaching it at the rate he was traveling. Without the ability to determine longitude at sea, he wouldn't have learned that his estimate was an error in time to return. Many of the educated classes believed the Earth was spherical since the works of the Greek philosophers Plato and Aristotle.^[13][14] Eratosthenesmade an accurate estimate of the Earth's diameter in approximately 240 BCE.^[15][16][17] See also Myth of the Flat Earth."

[tar]

Iggy,

 

You can call me TAR. I took on TAR2 as a signiture when I had left Guardian Talk for a few years, and went back to find another was signing in, and signing as TAR.

 

It has nothing to do with my equivocation. That is a personality trait of mine, by either signiture.

 

I think, now understanding better the why and what and wherefore of your discounting of faith in the personages that you understandably find it unbecoming in, I am fully ready to drop my argument. I was aiming at the wrong target.

 

I get your drift.

 

Regards, TAR

[john5746]

I... eh... yeah....

 

Parra Pa! Pa! Pa!

Oh, I thought it was this one.

 

 

 

Not really, just wanted to share some good music. They can really sing down there.

[John Cuthber]

No, science has affirmed that its right.

 

 

That's an old myth, people in the educated masses both religious and non-religious knew that the earth was spherical. What happened to Galileo was unfortunate.

 

"Christopher Columbus's efforts to obtain support for his voyages were not hampered by a European belief in a flat Earth. Sailors and navigators of the time knew that the Earth was roughly spherical, but (correctly) disagreed with Columbus's estimate of the distance to India, which was approximately one-sixth of the actual distance. If the Americas did not exist, and had Columbus continued to India, he would have run out of supplies before reaching it at the rate he was traveling. Without the ability to determine longitude at sea, he wouldn't have learned that his estimate was an error in time to return. Many of the educated classes believed the Earth was spherical since the works of the Greek philosophers Plato and Aristotle.^[13][14] Eratosthenesmade an accurate estimate of the Earth's diameter in approximately 240 BCE.^[15][16][17] See also Myth of the Flat Earth."

Science does not affirm that at all.

If you think it does, please cite some evidence (and please don't waste yet more time with arguments from authority).

Otherwise stop making that false claim.

 

I know the Ancient Greeks knew it was round, but older peoples thought it was flat.

Since they are older, according to your argument, those older people were right so the earth is flat.

Or do you realise that "old" isn't the same as "right"?

[Iggy]

Iggy,

 

You can call me TAR. I took on TAR2 as a signiture when I had left Guardian Talk for a few years, and went back to find another was signing in, and signing as TAR.

 

Well that makes sense. You had a name and you chose it, but somebody else came along and chose the same. So... you forever backed down and decided to call yourself #2 in this forgotten encounter. This is 100% predictable and I should have none the less guessed it. This is my bad.

 

It has nothing to do with my equivocation. That is a personality trait of mine, by either signiture.

 

I think, now understanding better the why and what and wherefore of your discounting of faith in the personages that you understandably find it unbecoming in, I am fully ready to drop my argument. I was aiming at the wrong target.

 

I get your drift.

 

Regards, TAR

 

Oh! that's rich!

 

You are going to drop your argument aimed at exactly who? Who are you aiming this argument at and exactly who is going to be hit with it? You say that you're an atheist then you go on to advocate the exact opposite of atheism. This isn't an argument aimed at anybody. This is an apology. There is something deeply woven and well constructed that we haven't gotten to the bottom of.

[john5746]

hmmm... for some reason, I'm reminded of this

[Iggy]

hmmm... for some reason, I'm reminded of this

 

That was funny

 

Everybody is trading songs around here. Yours reminded me of Edward Sharpe and the magnetic zeros.

 

Good stuff, but I'm not trying to be a dick. I'm trying to encourage Tar to be one. It's completely different.

[tar]

Iggy,

 

I am at a small disadvantage at the moment, as I do not have sound on my computer. (I broke my .exe executing ability downloading some program I was duped into thinking was going to give me some pdf powers, that begain a scan and manipulate and destroy routine instead, and have not yet figured how to remedy the situation, short of starting over.)

 

My assumption was, that there is a certian element of people with ill will or disregard for the rest of us, that you are against, and you are arguing against them. If my ideas were and line of reasoning was tending to support the people you are against, and I was against the same people, I figured my "target", in the case of arguing with you, may be misaquired, an unintended.

 

Now, I have not heard the "dick" song, so I am blindly proceeding, unaware of which direction along what lines, would take me deeper into dickland or lead me out of it. Nor do I know if being a dick is being currently held (in terms of the thread) as a positive or negative thing, in terms of people having faith in something.

 

Is it the people that have put their faith in something that are dicks, or the people that have not?

 

That being the case, that I am blind, or in this case deaf to the situation, I will have to step back a step explain my purpose, and then proceed to "get at" the deeply woven stuff.

 

This is the Philosophy/Religion section of a science forum. The purpose of the Religion section, is to investigate and discuss the rational foundations of religion. This presupposes that it is possible that there may be rational foundations to consider.

Since there is little evidence that sky pixies have given religion to us, we must have made it up on our own, constructed it from whole cloth. I am after the fibres that we have wooven together, or that others have spun for us.

 

My central theme, the perspective I am approaching this from, is "the meaning behind language". I take this tact, because language is something all humans have, even the deaf and blind and dumb ones. And evidence shows that there is a certain universal grammar that all humans use and understand. This I take as evidence that the brain/body/heart group that I have, is rather similar in structure and function to that of my human friends, and that of my human enemies. Common to both those I align myself with, and those I make effort to protect myself and my way of life against.

 

And if there is meaning that all language has, if there is "meaning behind language" there must be something we mean by using it. We cannot sense something, or be informed of something, if there is not something informing us. There must be a form "out there", that gets "in" here, into this TAR2 brain/body/heart group, in some analog, symbolic, representative fashion.

 

If I have "faith" in this outside thing existing, independently of that of it, that I have been informed of, I have done nothing differently than every other body/brain/heart group, on the planet.

 

So I argue from this stance, and feel that scientifically speaking, there must be something that someone is referring to, something that someone means, when they use the word God, and something that they mean, when they say they have faith in it. Although its rather obvious that an atheist is therefore not using God in the same sense that a believer in God means it.

 

Regards, TAR2

So is the thread question talking about scientific people and believers in God mixing, or is it asking if Science and God can mix within one person?

[Iggy]

Iggy,

 

I am at a small disadvantage at the moment, as I do not have sound on my computer. (I broke my .exe executing ability downloading some program I was duped into thinking was going to give me some pdf powers, that begain a scan and manipulate and destroy routine instead, and have not yet figured how to remedy the situation, short of starting over.)

 

Ouch! I do not envy you that

 

My assumption was, that there is a certian element of people with ill will or disregard for the rest of us, that you are against, and you are arguing against them.

 

I appreciate how you put that, but it's actually the religious people who wish me ill that I respect slightly more than the smiling glad-hands who pretend to be on my side. The first is respectable and honest, and the second is entirely disdainful.

 

Now, I have not heard the "dick" song, so I am blindly proceeding, unaware of which direction along what lines, would take me deeper into dickland or lead me out of it. Nor do I know if being a dick is being currently held (in terms of the thread) as a positive or negative thing, in terms of people having faith in something.

 

Is it the people that have put their faith in something that are dicks, or the people that have not?

 

Oh... It's not the best of songs... The lyrics are in the spirit of a cover of "anyone else buy you" of the Moldy Peaches and go something like "It's not hard to be a bully or a jerk. The internet makes it less time consuming work. But, consider who you are when ppl don't agree with you. Be "fun and friendly". Don't go berserk and be a dick!"

 

In other words, John was calling me a dick for bulling you. It's ok. If I really thought you were someone who minded being pushed a little, I wouldn't do it. It's all in good fun, and I suspect John was posting in good spirit too. The "Good stuff, but I'm not trying to be a dick. I'm trying to encourage Tar to be one" was my attempt to be humorous.

 

Don't get me wrong... I'd rather you planted your flag in camp atheism and argue from it, like I said, but I don't encourage you to be a dick about it. That was just a bit of playful wording.

 

The purpose of the Religion section, is to investigate and discuss the rational foundations of religion. This presupposes that it is possible that there may be rational foundations to consider.

 

at least we've identified the problem.

 

So I argue from this stance, and feel that scientifically speaking, there must be something that someone is referring to, something that someone means, when they use the word God, and something that they mean, when they say they have faith in it. Although its rather obvious that an atheist is therefore not using God in the same sense that a believer in God means it.

 

I can't tell you how much I respect religious people who say exactly what they mean when they have faith in it. All I'm saying is that I don't see that from you. When you say the pantheism things you say it doesn't look real to me. It looks like an apology. I don't feel it, but I guess that isn't something too worth going on and on about.

[tar]

Iggy,

 

Thanks for the lyrics. Can you hum a few bars? I guess you would have to use musical notation in my case, for me to hear. But then again, I have other computers in the house, whose sound is working, so it would be easier for me to just go upstairs.

 

Anyway, I was watching the St. Patrick's day parade today and the religion I sensed in and around the proceedings was not a bad thing. It had more to do with believing in each other than something other than us. One of the peices on the coverage I saw was the oath, taken by soon to be Airmen, who pledged their faith and alligence to the flag of the U.S. and to the country that it represented.

 

Made me think again of what faith and alligence are. What do they mean. They are not subtances in a literal sense, but are substances in a figurative sense, that have real consequence and real existence. In the same sense as a promise does. To put faith in something, it has to be something of yours, that you are giving to the other thing. I had, a while back, come up with a definition for love. "Love is when you include another entity, in your feeling of self." Perhaps faith is when you put something of yourself into another entity and feel secure about the investment.

 

In the linguistic way I am looking for "meaning" I am proposing that there is a valuable commodity that we deal in that has our consciouness as the currency. That is not readily measured, in and of itself, but is noticable in its consequences, and its apparent presence through signs and signals we give to each other. What is it worth, to have somebody's, attention, or love, or obiedience or trust.

Why would one consider it enriching to have somebody else, put their faith in them, if it were not enriching?

 

In your song the moldy one asks me who I have been giving myself away to, with no return on investment.

 

A reasonable question. But not one easily answered by someone not involved in the transaction.

 

"anyone else buy you"

 

The "you" here, is referring, in my estimation to the substance that is used in faith, charity and love transactions. It should not be spent unwisely. And we all hate to see it cast to the pigs. As we would hate to see someone we care about waste their money, we don't like seeing the other valuable substance being misspent or lost or stolen.

 

But as metaphors go, putting ones faith in God, would be quite a waste, if God does not exist.

To those on the board, like iNow, and ydoaPs, this is the warning they issue. Don't put your faith in something that does not exist, when there is so much that does exist, for you to put your faith in.

 

My argument has been for a while, that there is a large amount of real stuff that people of faith are putting their faith into. I argue this, because I have faith invested in the same real stuff that religious people I know have invested in. And I know there is no way to show my bank account to you.

 

Interesting though that before, on this or the faith thread, you or Phi used the "keeping two sets of books" metaphor. Perhaps one is the knowledge, capability account, and the other is the faith, trust account.

 

Seems they are not therefore mutually exclusive, and one can be rich in both senses, poor in both senses, or some combination.

 

And it is possible for me to give credit to Iggy for being a scientist, and also for me to give credit to Iggy for caring about others.

 

Which would answer the thread question in the affirmative. Whether considering two people, or considering oneself.

 

Regards, TAR2

 

The Panthiest thing, is just the closest religious thought I have found so far, that fits, in my case.

It does not mean I am one.

 

As in, "I put my faith in everything"

 

Only dishonest in the sense that I don't really mean everything, there is a great deal of people, things and ideas that I either am unaware of or have no faith in.

 

For instance, although I have some faith in any human, by virtue of their humanity, I completely closed my account in the case of Bin Laden and whathisname that killed the kids and teachers at Sandy Hook.

 

By the way, during the parade a bagpipe group stopped at the reviewing stand for a moment of silence, in rememberance of those lost that day...and played Amazing Grace. One of the commentators said that the whole parade stopped, and even the groups ahead stopped and turned...and he had never hear NYC so quiet.

 

Hey!

 

Heres another take on the science and God mix.

 

Consider the Blindmen and the Elephant story.

 

Each scientist argued with the other about the nature of the thing, it was rather like a tree, or a snake, or a leaf or a wall.

 

All of them were partly right and all partly wrong...but they were all talking about the elephant.

 

The SAME elephant.

Edited March 16, 2013 by tar

[Iggy]

Iggy,

 

Thanks for the lyrics. Can you hum a few bars? I guess you would have to use musical notation in my case, for me to hear. But then again, I have other computers in the house, whose sound is working, so it would be easier for me to just go upstairs.

 

So you've placed your faith in the wrong computer. That will happen.

 

But as metaphors go, putting ones faith in God, would be quite a waste, if God does not exist.

To those on the board, like iNow, and ydoaPs, this is the warning they issue. Don't put your faith in something that does not exist, when there is so much that does exist, for you to put your faith in.

 

My argument has been for a while, that there is a large amount of real stuff that people of faith are putting their faith into. I argue this, because I have faith invested in the same real stuff that religious people I know have invested in. And I know there is no way to show my bank account to you.

 

Interesting though that before, on this or the faith thread, you or Phi used the "keeping two sets of books" metaphor. Perhaps one is the knowledge, capability account, and the other is the faith, trust account.

 

That was me who used that metaphor. I don't recall if it was this thread or another, but, no... you're wrong on the sets of books. God is not falsifiable and has no confirmation yet people believe. Science is falsifiable yet scientists always doubt. Those are the sets of books and they are 100% mutually exclusive. They are polar opposites.

 

edit... I forgot to clinch up this case (no euphemism meant)

 

It's just that I agree with you where you say that the same person can keep two sets of books. A person can keep two sets of books like nothing else. We're very good at it. How does the saying go? "If Muhammad can't move the mountain then he must move to the Mountain?" Both options are available. I can't guarantee or prove the success of either option. But I absolutely know which option you'd try. I see you arguing against that very option and it makes me weary. You are smuggling something across boarders and I'm determined to find it.

Edited March 17, 2013 by Iggy

[tar]

Iggy,

 

Once was a mystery riddle where the border guards were alerted to a known smuggler approaching the border. They stopped him, stripped searched him and took his bicycle apart, checking that there was nothing in the tires or the hollow tubes. They found nothing. They put the bike back together, apologized for the inconvience and sent him on his way. The next week, the same scene was repeated and again they found nothing. They couldn't figure out what he was up to.

 

Smuggling bicycles of course, was the answer to the riddle.

 

Regards, TAR2

P.S. Not to speak poorly of the dead, but I think Christopher Hitchings was a bit of a dick. I don't want to be like him, even if I agree with his thinking. Perhaps I am trying to smuggle anti-Hitchings serum into the atheist camp. Not to change any minds, but to acknowledge the hearts involved.

Or perhaps iNow and I are using the ole good cop, bad cop routine as we interrogate the captive thiest.

 

Or maybe I am allowing myself some fanciful room to still be, in some way, even if TAR2 should die.

 

I am rather attached to existence. I have no interest in doing without it. I want to associate with it as fully as appears to be the case.

If this feeling or thought leaks into religious thought and feeling, it is an indication to me, that I might be harboring the same thoughts and feelings that a religious person has. Even though my Mom is dead, she is still in my memory. Her consciousness is stiil known to me. I can talk with her, as an unseen other, and consider her thoughts and emotions, almost as surely as I can do the same with my wife, who is currently in another state, or my dad, who is alive and about 30 miles away, and the same with my wife's aunt, who I saw just two weeks ago, who died unexpectedly two Thursdays ago. If I carry the departed in my heart and mind, they are not completely erased from reality. They still mean something to me, and influence my thoughts and actions.

I count on it being the same way, when I die. Those who's life I touched will still have me in their memory. Any works I did will still have been done. Anything I built will still stand. Anything I created will be a part of reality. For me to believe in life after death, it does not require that I be alive myself after my death. That does not happen. That is impossible. I can not be the living body/brain/heart group, that is TAR2, once TAR2 dies. But I still would have been TAR2, and reality would not forget that fact. I know this to be fact because I lit a match when I was 15 (or so) and held it to the stars, and that light is still traveling, even though the match is extinguished.

Edited March 17, 2013 by tar

[Iggy]

Iggy,

 

Once was a mystery riddle where the border guards were alerted to a known smuggler approaching the border. They stopped him, stripped searched him and took his bicycle apart, checking that there was nothing in the tires or the hollow tubes. They found nothing. They put the bike back together, apologized for the inconvience and sent him on his way. The next week, the same scene was repeated and again they found nothing. They couldn't figure out what he was up to.

 

Smuggling bicycles of course, was the answer to the riddle.

 

 

I liked that. Very applicable metaphor. I'm seriously impressed.

 

 

P.S. Not to speak poorly of the dead, but I think Christopher Hitchings was a bit of a dick. I don't want to be like him, even if I agree with his thinking.

 

Oddly enough, you're the second person in about a month on this site to unprompted tell me you disagree with this dead guy you mention, and you both misspelled his name in the process. I don't care if you speak ill of the dead (they don't either), I just want to know where this army of people who continue arguing with a dead man whose name they constantly mistake comes from. I feel near it.