Author Topic: Searching for GOD...  (Read 3866319 times)

torridon

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Re: Searching for GOD...
« Reply #22925 on: October 07, 2017, 10:13:12 AM »
But unlike the apples, the physicist has no definitive explanation for how our conscious awareness works or what it comprises.  All we have is correlation of brain activity, but this correlation does not define the properties of conscious awareness.  To draw conclusions from this little knowledge is not valid.  The spiritual properties of our conscious awareness and free thinking are beyond human scientific investigation.

We don't have definitive explanations for anything.  Even that physicist has no definitive explanation of gravity yet that doesn't stop us form putting satellites into orbit.  We work with the best knowledge currently to hand; likewise with conscious experience, of course we do not fully understand it, we perhaps never will, but that shouldn't blind us to the insights that we have acquired to date. As we speak, there is a startup in Cambridge working on a human implantable USB port, initially intended with smart prosthetics in mind and none of this thought control technology would attract funding had we no insight into the material basis of thoughts.
« Last Edit: October 07, 2017, 10:15:25 AM by torridon »

Walt Zingmatilder

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Re: Searching for GOD...
« Reply #22926 on: October 07, 2017, 10:19:11 AM »
We don't have definitive explanations for anything.  Even that physicist has no definitive explanation of gravity
And yet some demand definitive explanations of God.

floo

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Re: Searching for GOD...
« Reply #22927 on: October 07, 2017, 10:30:55 AM »
Not if we have been given the freedom to avoid these consequences if we so wish.

That is not freedom that is a nasty threat, totally unjustified as there is no verifiable evidence that god exists.

Sebastian Toe

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Re: Searching for GOD...
« Reply #22928 on: October 07, 2017, 10:59:25 AM »
And yet some demand definitive explanations of God.
And yet some, who claim to have had contact with said God, give no meaningful explanations at all........ :-\
"The word God is for me nothing more than the expression and product of human weaknesses, the Bible a collection of honourable, but still primitive legends.'
Albert Einstein

Walt Zingmatilder

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Re: Searching for GOD...
« Reply #22929 on: October 07, 2017, 11:04:25 AM »
And yet some, who claim to have had contact with said God, give no meaningful explanations at all........ :-\
Hypobole.

floo

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Re: Searching for GOD...
« Reply #22930 on: October 07, 2017, 11:20:19 AM »
Hypobole.

Sez the expert in the art of hyperbole, even if you can't spell it. ;D

Alan Burns

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Re: Searching for GOD...
« Reply #22931 on: October 07, 2017, 11:29:54 AM »
We don't have definitive explanations for anything.  Even that physicist has no definitive explanation of gravity yet that doesn't stop us form putting satellites into orbit.  We work with the best knowledge currently to hand; likewise with conscious experience, of course we do not fully understand it, we perhaps never will, but that shouldn't blind us to the insights that we have acquired to date. As we speak, there is a startup in Cambridge working on a human implantable USB port, initially intended with smart prosthetics in mind and none of this thought control technology would attract funding had we no insight into the material basis of thoughts.
The properties of gravity are well known and can easily be demonstrated and used anywhere.  Not so with human conscious awareness, the properties of which can only exist in human beings.
The truth will set you free  - John 8:32
Truth is not an abstraction, but a person - Edith Stein
Free will, though it makes evil possible, is also the only thing that makes possible any love or goodness or joy worth having. - CS Lewis
Joy is the Gigantic Secret of Christians - GK Chesterton

Shaker

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Re: Searching for GOD...
« Reply #22932 on: October 07, 2017, 11:55:39 AM »
Aw, look at the special little cupcake.
Pain, or damage, don't end the world. Or despair, or fucking beatings. The world ends when you're dead. Until then, you got more punishment in store. Stand it like a man, and give some back. - Al Swearengen, Deadwood.

floo

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Re: Searching for GOD...
« Reply #22933 on: October 07, 2017, 12:00:21 PM »
The properties of gravity are well known and can easily be demonstrated and used anywhere.  Not so with human conscious awareness, the properties of which can only exist in human beings.

Animals of other species have conscious awareness too. In humans it might be more developed, but why you attribute it to gifts bestowed by god, instead of nature, goodness only knows.

Shaker

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Re: Searching for GOD...
« Reply #22934 on: October 07, 2017, 12:01:18 PM »
Animals of other species have conscious awareness too, humans might be more developed, but why you attribute that to gifts bestowed by god, instead of nature, goodness only knows.
Because of his desperate wish not to belong to the animal kingdom.
Pain, or damage, don't end the world. Or despair, or fucking beatings. The world ends when you're dead. Until then, you got more punishment in store. Stand it like a man, and give some back. - Al Swearengen, Deadwood.

floo

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Re: Searching for GOD...
« Reply #22935 on: October 07, 2017, 12:03:01 PM »
Because of his desperate wish not to belong to the animal kingdom.

Maybe he would have thought differently when swinging through the trees with our ancestors. ;D

Shaker

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Re: Searching for GOD...
« Reply #22936 on: October 07, 2017, 12:07:16 PM »
Maybe he would have thought differently when swinging through the trees with our ancestors. ;D
Well let's face it, intellectually he's still at that stage now.
Pain, or damage, don't end the world. Or despair, or fucking beatings. The world ends when you're dead. Until then, you got more punishment in store. Stand it like a man, and give some back. - Al Swearengen, Deadwood.

Sebastian Toe

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Re: Searching for GOD...
« Reply #22937 on: October 07, 2017, 12:26:57 PM »
"The word God is for me nothing more than the expression and product of human weaknesses, the Bible a collection of honourable, but still primitive legends.'
Albert Einstein

Sebastian Toe

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Re: Searching for GOD...
« Reply #22938 on: October 07, 2017, 12:28:56 PM »
The properties of gravity are well known and can easily be demonstrated and used anywhere.  Not so with human conscious awareness, the properties of which can only exist in human beings.
Is that a bit like, chimpanzee conscious awareness, whose properties can only exist in chimpanzees?
"The word God is for me nothing more than the expression and product of human weaknesses, the Bible a collection of honourable, but still primitive legends.'
Albert Einstein

Alan Burns

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Re: Searching for GOD...
« Reply #22939 on: October 07, 2017, 12:29:07 PM »
Well let's face it, intellectually he's still at that stage now.
As a fellow Christian once said to me - when all else fails and they can't produce an effective response, they will resort to ridicule.
The truth will set you free  - John 8:32
Truth is not an abstraction, but a person - Edith Stein
Free will, though it makes evil possible, is also the only thing that makes possible any love or goodness or joy worth having. - CS Lewis
Joy is the Gigantic Secret of Christians - GK Chesterton

Gordon

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Re: Searching for GOD...
« Reply #22940 on: October 07, 2017, 12:38:14 PM »
As a fellow Christian once said to me - when all else fails and they can't produce an effective response, they will resort to ridicule.

Sometimes, Alan, ridicule is a perfectly reasonable response since you seem to be permanently wedded to the range of fallacious reasoning errors you consistently make even after these are pointed out to you.

bluehillside Retd.

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Re: Searching for GOD...
« Reply #22941 on: October 07, 2017, 12:46:21 PM »
AB,

Quote
As a fellow Christian once said to me - when all else fails and they can't produce an effective response, they will resort to ridicule.

Your problem Alan isn't that "they" can't produce an effective response, it's that you don't understand why it is an effective response. Just ignoring the arguments that undo you doesn't in other words make them go away. 
"Don't make me come down there."

God

Alan Burns

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Re: Searching for GOD...
« Reply #22942 on: October 07, 2017, 01:18:40 PM »
Sometimes, Alan, ridicule is a perfectly reasonable response since you seem to be permanently wedded to the range of fallacious reasoning errors you consistently make even after these are pointed out to you.
I think comparing my intellect to that of a chimpanzee swinging through the trees is a step too far.
The truth will set you free  - John 8:32
Truth is not an abstraction, but a person - Edith Stein
Free will, though it makes evil possible, is also the only thing that makes possible any love or goodness or joy worth having. - CS Lewis
Joy is the Gigantic Secret of Christians - GK Chesterton

ippy

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Re: Searching for GOD...
« Reply #22943 on: October 07, 2017, 01:30:12 PM »
As a fellow Christian once said to me - when all else fails and they can't produce an effective response, they will resort to ridicule.

Alan I was wondering if you've noticed the sheer number of catch-22 elements/arguments that have been built in to securely retain you all within in the fold and I wondered if you had ever paused to take some serious thoughts about them? I wouldn't have thought they were there by accident.

This he, she or it god idea of yours can't be feeling that secure if he, she or it feels the need to insert so many protective measures within he, she or its literature, only if this figure idea inside your head is so powerful what is it he, she or it so worried about, he, she or it only has to metaphorically wave a wand and any problem whatever it might be is solved?

ippy   

Sebastian Toe

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Re: Searching for GOD...
« Reply #22944 on: October 07, 2017, 01:34:41 PM »
I think comparing my intellect to that of a chimpanzee swinging through the trees is a step too far.
I dont think anyone actually did that though.
Did your soul misinterpret that?
"The word God is for me nothing more than the expression and product of human weaknesses, the Bible a collection of honourable, but still primitive legends.'
Albert Einstein

ippy

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Re: Searching for GOD...
« Reply #22945 on: October 07, 2017, 01:36:02 PM »
I think comparing my intellect to that of a chimpanzee swinging through the trees is a step too far.

I really don't think you realise how heavily indoctrinated you are into that religious stuff Alan, the weight of your indoctrination sticks out like a sore thumb, in more or less everything you write.

ippy

Shaker

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Re: Searching for GOD...
« Reply #22946 on: October 07, 2017, 01:40:15 PM »
As a fellow Christian once said to me - when all else fails and they can't produce an effective response, they will resort to ridicule.
And as a far greater intellect than either once said: "Ridicule is the only weapon that can be used against unintelligible propositions."

Propositions such as yours, basically.
Pain, or damage, don't end the world. Or despair, or fucking beatings. The world ends when you're dead. Until then, you got more punishment in store. Stand it like a man, and give some back. - Al Swearengen, Deadwood.

Shaker

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Re: Searching for GOD...
« Reply #22947 on: October 07, 2017, 01:41:38 PM »
I think comparing my intellect to that of a chimpanzee swinging through the trees is a step too far.
To the worldwide population of Pan troglodytes I retract my comment and offer an unqualified and unreserved apology.
Pain, or damage, don't end the world. Or despair, or fucking beatings. The world ends when you're dead. Until then, you got more punishment in store. Stand it like a man, and give some back. - Al Swearengen, Deadwood.

Walt Zingmatilder

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Re: Searching for GOD...
« Reply #22948 on: October 07, 2017, 01:45:27 PM »
To the worldwide population of Pan troglodytes I retract my comment and offer an unqualified and unreserved apology.
Chimps? can't trust the bastards.

floo

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Re: Searching for GOD...
« Reply #22949 on: October 07, 2017, 01:47:08 PM »
I think comparing my intellect to that of a chimpanzee swinging through the trees is a step too far.

I didn't compare your present day intellect to that of a monkey, although some apes are considered to be quite intelligent like the ones who make and use primitive tools. Back in the day, I doubt what went on to be the human animal was very different to our monkey cousins.