Searching for GOD...

[torridon]

I need a starting point, the only thing I can come up with at the moment ( because it has been clanging about in my head for ages ) God is persistent, God, the idea of God has been around since we first stepped out of the cave, or maybe when we first stepped into a cave.

Persistence in itself is no guarantee that our ideas are correct.  Our intuitions evolved over millions of years and we do not easily just drop them now that we are all tooled up with technology. For instance we all live with an intuitive belief in absolute space and time despite the fact that we have known that to be incorrect for a hundred years already.

[Walt Zingmatilder]

Nope.

Ah you are doing the shuffle......

Sorry no coins in hat because your shuffle isn't anywhere near as entertaining as Outriders was.

So it wasn't uncreated and it wasn't created......oh no .....you are building up to a courtiers reply aren't you.

[Walt Zingmatilder]

. For instance we all live with an intuitive belief in absolute space and time despite the fact that we have known that to be incorrect for a hundred years already.

Do we can you provide citations for that?

[Shaker]

He do we can.

[torridon]

The problem I have with any material description of conscious awareness is the lack of any definition of a recipient of all the information which comprises awareness.  For awareness to exist, there must be a single entity which can perceive the physical content of many millions of brain cells at any instant of time.  Some people confuse reaction with perception.  A computer can react to the content of millions of silicon chips, but nowhere in the computer is anything which can actually perceive the content of those chips.  A reaction merely induces more molecular activity, but there is still nothing to actually perceive this activity in material terms.  Conscious awareness must comprise of some entity which can simultaneously perceive the content of many individual brain cells.  This is just my interpretation of one of the functions of our spiritual soul.

Your soul thesis only further complicates an already difficult area.  I agree it's not easy to conceptualise how the feeling of a single point of perception and agency and self arises yet that is clearly fundamental primary brain function. Your thesis is effectively that it is a soul that is responsible for this brain function which leaves us pondering why we have a brain in the first place if we also have a soul somehow mirroring brain function; it also leaves us pondering how other creatures other than Sapiens manage to get by without a soul if this thing is so essential.

[Alan Burns]

What caused your God to exist.

Remember you too have to bootstrap a God from nothing.

At least we can see the universe and we do not need the extra step

Are you suggesting that nothing existed before the universe began?  Can you really contemplate a state where nothing exists, not even time or space, then suddenly a Big Bang occurs?

[Alan Burns]

Did something bring this universe into being, then? That's news to me. What do you know that I don't? (Remember I said know, not believe, Alan  ).
Why is it?

How about the word "deduce" ?

[Walt Zingmatilder]

He do we can.

Every day yo! Shuffle in.

I would like to see those NOW 😀

[Shaker]

How about the word "deduce" ?

How about providing a methodology against which your deductions can be tested for their accuracy or lack thereof?

[torridon]

Persistence in itself is no guarantee that our ideas are correct.  Our intuitions evolved over millions of years and we do not easily just drop them now that we are all tooled up with technology. For instance we all live with an intuitive belief in absolute space and time despite the fact that we have known that to be incorrect for a hundred years already.

Do we can you provide citations for that?

The way things seem to us, is a consequence of how our brains have developed. Thus we are all comfortable imagining ourselves in a Euclidian space, but that is perhaps a bias that owes in part to our evolution in a low gravity field in which Euclidian geometry is good enough. Our perceptions and our intuitions are informed by our developmental history and they have no remit to be true to reality, rather they observe the paradigm of what is effective, what has utility, what has helped us to survive and procreate in the past.

[Alan Burns]

I was just reminded of the truly awesome opening to St John's Gospel:

In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. He was with God in the beginning. Through him all things were made; without him nothing was made that has been made. In him was life, and that life was the light of all mankind. The light shines in the darkness, and the darkness has not overcome it.

[Shaker]

Oh, well, that makes all the difference 

[Walt Zingmatilder]

Do we can you provide citations for that?


The way things seem to us, is a consequence of how our brains have developed. Thus we are all comfortable imagining ourselves in a Euclidian space, but that is perhaps a bias that owes in part to our evolution in a low gravity field in which Euclidian geometry is good enough. Our perceptions and our intuitions are informed by our developmental history and they have no remit to be true to reality, rather they observe the paradigm of what is effective, what has utility, what has helped us to survive and procreate in the past.

I'm not sure how true that is since we live in a world of externals. If we can land on distant planets then knowledge of the distances and gravitational forces must be more than the level of approximation to reality than you are suggesting.

Also our knowledge of things far exceeds that which can possibly have survival value.

[Walt Zingmatilder]

How about providing a methodology against which your deductions can be tested for their accuracy or lack thereof?

How about coming up with a third option to uncaused and caused?


Every day your shuffelin'

[Gonnagle]

Dear Leonard,

No Gonners, I don't think for one moment we are born believers. We learn ideas about "God" as we grow through childhood.

No argument from me old son and I have already had this discussion with ProfDavey, which is why I was trying to explain to Blue about wiping the slate clean, the theory/hypothesis regarding us as born believers ( not born God believers ) is relatively new, I think it has been doing the rounds for about 15 years ( in science, a mere blip ).

I know that children get the idea of God from adults, you, me, we got the Christian idea, you have come to the concussion that it does not work, me, I find it works everyday ( my Christianity, not Vlads, or Alans, not decrying Vlad or Alans faith, faith is a very personal thing ).

But this new science or hypothesis makes perfect sense to me, we can only guess at what a baby goes through in the womb, but one scientist likens being born, taken from the womb, it is tens times more frightening than throwing yourself out of an aeroplane ( I am quoting from memory, I may not have it exactly right ).

What does that experience do to us, well guess work again, but that baby needs something, a reassurance, where does it find it, a big God like creature, the mother.

Of course this says nothing about God, but I think it says, natural born believers.

Gonnagle.

[Gonnagle]

Dear Torridon,

Persistence in itself is no guarantee that our ideas are correct.  Our intuitions evolved over millions of years and we do not easily just drop them now that we are all tooled up with technology. For instance we all live with an intuitive belief in absolute space and time despite the fact that we have known that to be incorrect for a hundred years already.

I instinctively know there is a God, my gut feeling tells me there is a God.

Yes our intuitions have evolved over millions of years, and they have done a grand job, without them me and you might not be having this discussion.

http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/intuition

Gonnagle.

[floo]

Dear Torridon,

I instinctively know there is a God, my gut feeling tells me there is a God.

Yes our intuitions have evolved over millions of years, and they have done a grand job, without them me and you might not be having this discussion.

http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/intuition

Gonnagle.

My husband instinctively knows no god exists!

[Gonnagle]

Dear Blue,

Seems to me that we're a species that's evolved to look for patterns, for explanations for the phenomena we perceive. It's served us well - we can fly rockets to the moon but chimps can't - but its legacy is that a conspiracy is better than no answer at all. That's what you're describing - countless peoples over the millennia have sought a higher causal agency, and so have come up with many, many supernatural "somethings" to fill the gap. This is actually an argument against your god speciically rather than for it. 

A long time ago in a land not so very far away called the BBC religious and ethics forum, a young Gonnagle ( well youngish ) was accused of using the God of the gaps argument, and verily I went away with my tail between my legs, asking, do I, well do I! but then I came to an epiphany, I don't put God in the gaps, I put God firmly in the science, why, well we are all made in Gods image, little mortals floundering to be like God, ripping the mask off nature to see the face of God, but as a Christian I wonder, with every scientific advancement do we get nearer to God or further away?

Gonnagle.

[Leonard James]

I know that children get the idea of God from adults, you, me, we got the Christian idea, you have come to the concussion that it does not work, me, I find it works everyday ( my Christianity, not Vlads, or Alans, not decrying Vlad or Alans faith, faith is a very personal thing ).

Which leaves me wondering what exactly is your "Christian idea"? Because it seems to me that your modus operandi for living is much the same as mine!

[Enki]

The problem I have with any material description of conscious awareness is the lack of any definition of a recipient of all the information which comprises awareness.  For awareness to exist, there must be a single entity which can perceive the physical content of many millions of brain cells at any instant of time.  Some people confuse reaction with perception.  A computer can react to the content of millions of silicon chips, but nowhere in the computer is anything which can actually perceive the content of those chips.  A reaction merely induces more molecular activity, but there is still nothing to actually perceive this activity in material terms.  Conscious awareness must comprise of some entity which can simultaneously perceive the content of many individual brain cells.  This is just my interpretation of one of the functions of our spiritual soul.

Thanks for the response, Alan.

You are enumerating what scientists call the binding problem, which seems integral to any understanding of what consciousness really is. In other words, how does information encoded in different parts of the brain come together in our conscious mind. As yet we do not know, but neuroscientists have a range of hypotheses which attempt to explain this phenomenon. For instance, Penrose and Hameroff suggested that microtubules(strings of protein) in the brain can behave as quantum objects that can connect with others in a process known as entanglement making the brain a sort of quantum computer. Although the idea of microtubules has now been discounted, one much more recent suggestion is that ion channels in neuronal cells(which we already know transmit nerve signals within the brain,) could be responsible when linked to the brain's electromagnetic field. In other words, the EM field, itself, is proposed as providing a seat for consciousness.(see work by Johnjoe Mcfadden).

Now I am not saying that anyone has solved the hard problem or even the binding problem of consciousness. Far from it,  but in recent decades neuroscientists have made huge strides in understanding the brain, and are attacking the age old problem of consciousness with renewed vigour. Time will tell whether any major breakthroughs result.

In contrast what do you offer? A 'spiritual soul' which you cannot define, you cannot locate, you cannot test to see if it actually exists, you cannot even examine where it goes when a person dies. You accept it only as a matter of faith.

For what reason should I accept your view rather than say we do not yet understand what consciousness is ? I find your vague idea of a soul unnecessary, unevidenced and deeply unsatisfying. For me, you aren't exactly cooking on gas. Of course you are welcome to your views, but I see no reason to change my own views unless I see actual evidence that this soul exists.

[Walt Zingmatilder]

Thanks for the response, Alan.

You are enumerating what scientists call the binding problem, which seems integral to any understanding of what consciousness really is. In other words, how does information encoded in different parts of the brain come together in our conscious mind. As yet we do not know, but neuroscientists have a range of hypotheses which attempt to explain this phenomenon. For instance, Penrose and Hameroff suggested that microtubules(strings of protein) in the brain can behave as quantum objects that can connect with others in a process known as entanglement making the brain a sort of quantum computer. Although the idea of microtubules has now been discounted, one much more recent suggestion is that ion channels in neuronal cells(which we already know transmit nerve signals within the brain,) could be responsible when linked to the brain's electromagnetic field. In other words, the EM field, itself, is proposed as providing a seat for consciousness.(see work by Johnjoe Mcfadden).

Now I am not saying that anyone has solved the hard problem or even the binding problem of consciousness. Far from it,  but in recent decades neuroscientists have made huge strides in understanding the brain, and are attacking the age old problem of consciousness with renewed vigour. Time will tell whether any major breakthroughs result.

In contrast what do you offer? A 'spiritual soul' which you cannot define, you cannot locate, you cannot test to see if it actually exists, you cannot even examine where it goes when a person dies. You accept it only as a matter of faith.

For what reason should I accept your view rather than say we do not yet understand what consciousness is ? I find your vague idea of a soul unnecessary, unevidenced and deeply unsatisfying. For me, you aren't exactly cooking on gas. Of course you are welcome to your views, but I see no reason to change my own views unless I see actual evidence that this soul exists.

It seems to me their is a further problem. Even though all information could end up being perceived as some kind of unity, that could be done by an unconscious processor.....I believe it's termed as a Chinese box. In other words are you properly distinguishing  between intelligence and consciousness

[Alan Burns]

Dear Blue,

A long time ago in a land not so very far away called the BBC religious and ethics forum, a young Gonnagle ( well youngish ) was accused of using the God of the gaps argument, and verily I went away with my tail between my legs, asking, do I, well do I! but then I came to an epiphany, I don't put God in the gaps, I put God firmly in the science, why, well we are all made in Gods image, little mortals floundering to be like God, ripping the mask off nature to see the face of God, but as a Christian I wonder, with every scientific advancement do we get nearer to God or further away?

Gonnagle.

Very well put   

[Gonnagle]

Dear Leonard,

Well yes, in my search to find out why atheists are atheists I keep coming up with the blindingly obvious, we are all human, deep down we all want the same things, when you or any atheist tells me, this is it, one life, I can relate to that and most of Jesus teachings are all about how we live, if there is an afterlife, well that's God territory not mine and I am not arrogant enough to say, who is going there and who is not, Gods territory again ( I am not God, god like, be gone ego )

My idea of Christianity is in the teachings of Our Lord, when I hear someone say, yes I have read the Bible, my immediate thought is, yes but have you studied the Bible, for me ( my opinion ) there is years of study just on the two Greatest commandments, which for me takes me into, Islam, Judaism, Sikhism, Hinduism, Paganism, hell even atheism.

The same can be said for, Mathew 7, or when Our Lord washes his disciples feet, it is all about being human, how we live this life.

To end Dear Leonard, yes we are alike, we are both cultural Christians, I just happen to be a God believing cultural Christian.

Gonnagle.

[Leonard James]

To end Dear Leonard, yes we are alike, we are both cultural Christians, I just happen to be a God believing cultural Christian.

Gonnagle.

I will try to remember that in my answers to your posts ... but forgive me if my oldish memory fails me! 

[Alan Burns]

As primitive man evolved, he developed awareness of his fate ... he saw that all living things die and disintegrate. It was not an enormous step from that awareness to invent a means of escaping it. Enter gods.

Len, you are very good at deducing some form of logical explanation for things that have already happened.

Have you ever tried to see things the other way round? -
For example imagine you are an observer of the universe when it began.  You see this cloud of burning gas, the formation of stars which then explode, the debris then speading to orbit round other stars.  Then amid all this chaos, something quite remarkable starts to happen on the cooling crust of a tiny speck of molten rock ....