losing your religion

• Automatik

  

  Can you please provide a link?
• jmog

  Automatik;1792067 wrote:Can you please provide a link?

  Google is your friend. Google fine tuning, Google scientific information laws.
• Tiernan

  jmog;1792066 wrote:1. The only one evidence of sentient life is "we it has to exist with the trillions of stars in the universe".
  2. I have already talked about "fine tuning" being evidence that many scientists say suggest a supreme being causing the same order as it couldn't have been "random".
  3. DNA is a genetic information/language and the Scientific Second Law of Information states that information can only come from a sentient being.
  
  
  
  
  #3 leaves only aliens or a supreme being as the originator of life on Earth.

  Guess I'm betting on Wookies over Yawhehs
• jmog

  Tiernan;1792180 wrote:Guess I'm betting on Wookies over Yawhehs

  very plausible, but my question would be who/what planned the DNA/language of the Wookies/etc the "first or original aliens"
• O-Trap

  

  Glad to see that this topic doesn't disappoint.
  
  I grew up in a worldview I didn't really believe. Despite being surrounded by it, I really can't say I ever actually adopted an ideational worldview until after the age of 20. I always felt the pressure to act like I was already a "believer" (whatever that meant at the time) because my father was a pastor, and whether or not I believed it, it wouldn't have reflected well on him to have an outspokenly unbelieving son, and I thought it was bullshit that he should have to answer for my own beliefs.
  
  I read a lot on the topic, especially later in high school and early in college. Dawkins, Sagan, Camus, Russell, Hitchens, Mackie. Whether they were books or articles or even just quotes, I read whatever I could. Dawkins was a particular favorite because of his aggressive attitude in approaching anything religious. It resonated as someone striving to be decisive if the means were there to be decisive.
  
  Today, my worldview is much different, but it has really been shaped for close to a decade. There have been several influential people who I was able to engage over that time, because they demonstrated a passion for academic excellence and a high regard for building their own views on well-reasoned foundations.
  
  I suppose I could say I never lost it, but instead that I found it.
• Tiernan

  ^^^
  Soooo? Enlighten us Oh Wise One to this source of all existence ye have found.
• jmog

  Otrap and I had a similar experience. I think his college years of "researching" was more the philosophical side with some science where mine was the science side with some philosophy (correct me if I am wrong).
  
  Oh, my dad wasn't a pastor, just grew up in church and never really believed what was drilled in if that makes sense.
• O-Trap

  

  Tiernan;1792286 wrote:^^^
  Soooo? Enlighten us Oh Wise One to this source of all existence ye have found.

  I don't think I'm particularly wise or especially enlightened.
  
  And to my knowledge there's no "trump" nugget that settles the conversation in a nice, neat package that is easily regurgitated, especially down to the minutia of a worldview's development. Moreover, I don't claim to be done with my own, either. Nor do I suggest that I am absolutely correct in every area on which I've settled. Worldviews are developed over our entire lives.
  
  You can look at the distinction between sensate and ideational cultures under the assumption that evolution is toward a more robust existence like Sorokin. You can look at the morality implications of reality that doesn't exclude something beyond the physical universe and its laws like J. L. Mackie. You can look at life's relationship to nihilism like Camus. You can engage the natural world in pursuit of its origins like Hawking. You can even look at the curiosity of the finity of the timeline.
  
  Or hell, you could just try to make your way around China Town like Woody Allen. The point is that there was no "source," as it were. There were "sources" I suppose, but I've been coming across such sources for years and years. If I were able to explain all justification for my worldview in a single post, then I'd feel grossly unprepared to call it my worldview at all (which says something, because I have no problem typing a lot).
  
  At the end of the day, I've settled on what I think seems to make the most sense. If I sound hesitant to tell others that I have some special access to anything profound, it's because I am. I'm not here to tell you what to think. Neither am I here to tell you that you're bad or stupid if you don't agree with me. The former leads to shallow worldviews. The latter is simply not true.
• sleeper

  

  O-Trap;1792310 wrote:I don't think I'm particularly wise or especially enlightened.
  
  And to my knowledge there's no "trump" nugget that settles the conversation in a nice, neat package that is easily regurgitated, especially down to the minutia of a worldview's development. Moreover, I don't claim to be done with my own, either. Nor do I suggest that I am absolutely correct in every area on which I've settled. Worldviews are developed over our entire lives.
  
  You can look at the distinction between sensate and ideational cultures under the assumption that evolution is toward a more robust existence like Sorokin. You can look at the morality implications of reality that doesn't exclude something beyond the physical universe and its laws like J. L. Mackie. You can look at life's relationship to nihilism like Camus. You can engage the natural world in pursuit of its origins like Hawking. You can even look at the curiosity of the finity of the timeline.
  
  Or hell, you could just try to make your way around China Town like Woody Allen. The point is that there was no "source," as it were. There were "sources" I suppose, but I've been coming across such sources for years and years. If I were able to explain all justification for my worldview in a single post, then I'd feel grossly unprepared to call it my worldview at all (which says something, because I have no problem typing a lot).
  
  At the end of the day, I've settled on what I think seems to make the most sense. If I sound hesitant to tell others that I have some special access to anything profound, it's because I am. I'm not here to tell you what to think. Neither am I here to tell you that you're bad or stupid if you don't agree with me. The former leads to shallow worldviews. The latter is simply not true.

  This is a lot of verbiage for just saying "I have nothing".
• O-Trap

  

  sleeper;1792313 wrote:This is a lot of verbiage for just saying "I have nothing".

  Mackie's book (to date, the best argument for atheism despite its age, in my own opinion) essentially explained the seeming irreconcilable positions of belief in the absence of a sentient creator of some sort and belief in any objective form of morality. This would mean, for example, that Mackie's position would, in essence, label someone like Kant a hypocrite. I think Mackie explained his position more sufficiently. Under such a view, if one believes even in just minimalist ethics, it would necessitate someone to orchestrate a reality where those are able to be exemplified. Or, as one author put it, "The big bang didn't belch our moral laws in the same way it did clouds of gas."
  
  Beyond that, look at the properties of infinity as a math construct. It necessarily cannot be eclipsed or crossed. As such, if we apply the physical universe's experience of time (which is linear, regardless of whether or not time itself is cyclical or what you think about string theory's relationship with time) to the properties of infinity, then time had to have had a beginning. Since the natural universe exists within the experience of time in some form, time has to have predated our natural universe, despite the fact that time itself had to have a beginning (again, based on the properties of infinity). Had it not, we wouldn't have the current moment, because the universe would never have arrived at it. So, it stands to reason that something (in theory, sentient or otherwise) had to exist outside the confines of time in order to make it come into existence. It's not entirely unlike the Kalam Cosmological argument, but instead of simply dealing with the physical universe, it deals with time.
  
  These are merely two points in a long line of worldview shaping. The point of the post before was not that I have nothing, and I apologize if it came across that way. The point was that there's too much for me to try to put into a single post, whether because of time or because I don't have the memory for recalling everything I've ever done, read, studied, etc. that has shaped my worldview.
• Tiernan

  ^^^
  again...nothing. Either you believe in the fire & brimstone or you believe you once had an ancestor that crawled up on shore and walked on his fins. It's really fairly simple.
• sleeper

  

  O-Trap;1792316 wrote:Mackie's book (to date, the best argument for atheism despite its age, in my own opinion) essentially explained the seeming irreconcilable positions of belief in the absence of a sentient creator of some sort and belief in any objective form of morality. This would mean, for example, that Mackie's position would, in essence, label someone like Kant a hypocrite. I think Mackie explained his position more sufficiently. Under such a view, if one believes even in just minimalist ethics, it would necessitate someone to orchestrate a reality where those are able to be exemplified. Or, as one author put it, "The big bang didn't belch our moral laws in the same way it did clouds of gas."
  
  Beyond that, look at the properties of infinity as a math construct. It necessarily cannot be eclipsed or crossed. As such, if we apply the physical universe's experience of time (which is linear, regardless of whether or not time itself is cyclical or what you think about string theory's relationship with time) to the properties of infinity, then time had to have had a beginning. Since the natural universe exists within the experience of time in some form, time has to have predated our natural universe, despite the fact that time itself had to have a beginning (again, based on the properties of infinity). Had it not, we wouldn't have the current moment, because the universe would never have arrived at it. So, it stands to reason that something (in theory, sentient or otherwise) had to exist outside the confines of time in order to make it come into existence. It's not entirely unlike the Kalam Cosmological argument, but instead of simply dealing with the physical universe, it deals with time.
  
  These are merely two points in a long line of worldview shaping. The point of the post before was not that I have nothing, and I apologize if it came across that way. The point was that there's too much for me to try to put into a single post, whether because of time or because I don't have the memory for recalling everything I've ever done, read, studied, etc. that has shaped my worldview.

  Even if all of the above was true and without argument, this doesn't help any of the man made religions.
  
  It's much too philosophical for something that should be simple to explain and prove such as your god being the "correct" one. The reality is, it's far more likely they are all wrong.
• O-Trap

  

  Tiernan;1792324 wrote:^^^
  again...nothing. Either you believe in the fire & brimstone or you believe you once had an ancestor that crawled up on shore and walked on his fins. It's really fairly simple.

  Why is it an either/or scenario? Do tell.
  
  And I'd hardly call Mackie's position on moral values "nothing." Neither would I call mathematical laws "nothing." But that's just me.
  

  sleeper;1792328 wrote:Even if all of the above was true and without argument, this doesn't help any of the man made religions.

  The above are, indeed, true. One deals exclusively in Aristotelean logical law. The other deals in mathematical law. I'd be curious how they don't "help" (whatever that means) any man-made religion. More accurately, I'd be curious what "help" is supposed to mean in this case. I would submit that they either support or, at very least, lend credibility to the idea that there is something outside the physical universe that served in a causal capacity to it. Whether that's a given person's deity of choice is irrelevant unless these points are the entire case.
  

  sleeper;1792328 wrote:It's much too philosophical for something that should be simple to explain and prove such as your god being the "correct" one. The reality is, it's far more likely they are all wrong.

  In a way, theories on the origin of the physical universe have to be "philosophical" to some degree. We're talking about what "made" the physical universe happen. As such, you can't really appeal to the simplicity of the physical universe's laws.
  
  But for the record, neither is all that complicated. The mathematical laws involving infinity are especially simple. In either case, however, you can't approach a complicated topic and demand a simple answer. Well, you can, but you have no reasonable grounds for doing so.
• Apple

  

  Asking the simple question of, "How did we get here?" is, IMO, how religions throughout history started.
  
  As mankind has evolved and become more intelligent, the answer to the question has likewise evolved, though it remains elusive even today. I highly doubt mankind today will be the generation who discovers the ultimate answer.
  
  As philosophical as the question is, religions throughout history have basically turned it into various sociological directives that people have, rightly or wrongly, "faithfully" followed.
  
  For me, I answer the philosophical question by acknowledging that there must be some sort of "higher being" who created everything. I respond to the sociological aspects believing I should treat others as I would want to be treated.
  
  Though my rational may be simplistic, as well as Christian, I doubt anyone can prove me wrong during my lifetime.
• sleeper

  

  Apple;1792365 wrote: Though my rational may be simplistic, as well as Christian, I doubt anyone can prove me wrong during my lifetime.

  If this is your attitude and you believe this is a rational, logical statement, than we can prove without a doubt that you lack intellectual integrity.
  
  Do you feel the same way about invisible flying spaghetti monsters? They exist until YOU prove they don't exist? I'm thankful we live in a world of information at our fingertips instead of the totalitarianism that allowed religion to flourish by silencing any dissenting beliefs and relying on fear and ignorance to persuade the common folk.
• sleeper

  

  The above are, indeed, true. One deals exclusively in Aristotelean logical law. The other deals in mathematical law. I'd be curious how they don't "help" (whatever that means) any man-made religion. More accurately, I'd be curious what "help" is supposed to mean in this case. I would submit that they either support or, at very least, lend credibility to the idea that there is something outside the physical universe that served in a causal capacity to it. Whether that's a given person's deity of choice is irrelevant unless these points are the entire case.

  You know what I mean but you, like most believers, want to be obtuse and vague to avoid dealing with the simply truth that if you believe in a man made religion, it's entirely faith based.
  
  Providing logical support for a power unknown(or a 'god') does little to support that JC was the son of this god, that Mary was a virgin, or that the world flooded and Noah put 2 of every animal on a boat. Hopefully, scholars, in another 1000 years will be able to tell us what is supposed to be true in the bible and what is just a story. I wish we could apply this same methodology to everything else; its true until scholars determine that it's not true(or convenient since theology scholars are inherently biased). You can see quickly how reality and religion don't mix at all.
  
  When are religious believes going to grow up and accept their entire belief system is a fairy tale designed to manipulate them for money and influence?
• O-Trap

  

  sleeper;1792369 wrote:You know what I mean but you, like most believers, want to be obtuse and vague to avoid dealing with the simply truth that if you believe in a man made religion, it's entirely faith based.

  I find it hard to believe that someone who touts logic would call a mathematical law "obtuse" or "vague." Aren't those the antithesis of math, for the most part?
  
  The "simply" truth is that neither a sensate nor an ideational worldview is anything new. Neither is either one inherently more intellectually honest. Pitirim Sorokin did a good study on these throughout history. Both require some assumptions, sure, but neither is necessarily entirely faith-based (though both could be, depending on the person holding it). A philosophical foundation for a worldview is not the same as a fanciful or faith-based one. The former requires proper application of logical principles.
  

  sleeper;1792369 wrote:Providing logical support for a power unknown(or a 'god') does little to support that JC was the son of this god, that Mary was a virgin, or that the world flooded and Noah put 2 of every animal on a boat.

  I'm not disputing that at all. This is why it takes more than an unpacked nugget able to be regurgitated in a 15 minute post. I just suggested that those were reasons to support the foundation of any ideational worldview. The process is more like building a structure than just grabbing a few facts here and there and throwing them into a milieu of "supports" or "defeaters."
  
  All that to say that I'm not saying that the two things I mentioned were supports for the deity of the Judeo-Christian Bible. Merely that in order to arrive at the notion that there is any validity to the things you've mentioned, you first have to see sufficient grounds for a creator at all. Otherwise the rest is moot.
  

  sleeper;1792369 wrote:Hopefully, scholars, in another 1000 years will be able to tell us what is supposed to be true in the bible and what is just a story.

  I'm not sure how you would imagine this taking place, to be fair, though I'm perfectly okay with study into it. To quote St. Augustine, "We must show our scriptures not to be in conflict with whatever our critics can demonstrate about the nature of things from reliable sources." That is to say that I think it's good to use what we can know about the world through the use of our sensory faculties to shape our worldview. Ideational worldviews don't reject the sensate. They just don't exclude all else.
  

  sleeper;1792369 wrote:I wish we could apply this same methodology to everything else; its true until scholars determine that it's not true(or convenient since theology scholars are inherently biased).

  There are actually a fair number of theologians who aren't believers themselves. Moreover, there are more than a few who became believers through their study, and not the other way around. I'd hardly call that biased, but I WOULD say that they'd likely be a good source for why a belief exists at all.
  
  As for wanting to find some scholars you can take the word of, I don't think that would even satisfy you. That's saying, essentially, that you're just going to adopt someone's position without contemplation because you think of them as an expert. You seem like you're actually more thoughtful than that.
  

  sleeper;1792369 wrote:You can see quickly how reality and religion don't mix at all.

  I would suggest that reality requires something supernatural, if for no other reason than the refusal to accept that the natural is here "just because."
  

  sleeper;1792369 wrote:When are religious believes going to grow up and accept their entire belief system is a fairy tale designed to manipulate them for money and influence?

  Roundabout the same time the irreligious grow up and accept that while it has been used that way in recent history, there's little evidence to demonstrate the motives for any origins whatsoever.
  
  Damn it, Sleeper. I had hoped to avoid getting into these discussions on here. Nobody's mind is ever changed, and they're a time-suck.
• QuakerOats

  O-Trap;1792360 wrote:In a way, theories on the origin of the physical universe have to be "philosophical" to some degree. We're talking about what "made" the physical universe happen. As such, you can't really appeal to the simplicity of the physical universe's laws.

  
  
  Much of the essence of the debate.
• OSH

  

  Apple;1792365 wrote:Asking the simple question of, "How did we get here?" is, IMO, how religions throughout history started.
  
  As mankind has evolved and become more intelligent, the answer to the question has likewise evolved, though it remains elusive even today. I highly doubt mankind today will be the generation who discovers the ultimate answer.
  
  As philosophical as the question is, religions throughout history have basically turned it into various sociological directives that people have, rightly or wrongly, "faithfully" followed.
  
  For me, I answer the philosophical question by acknowledging that there must be some sort of "higher being" who created everything. I respond to the sociological aspects believing I should treat others as I would want to be treated.
  
  Though my rational may be simplistic, as well as Christian, I doubt anyone can prove me wrong during my lifetime.

  This is something I never really discuss. In the end, we'll never really know.
  
  There is absolutely zero proof we'll ever have in how "we got here" or "how the earth started." No one can verify it. No one was there. It's all theory. It's all faith in something -- science or belief system.
  
  I never get in discussions about "how old is the earth?" To me, it does nothing to prove or disprove anything. I don't know. I don't care. My thoughts and beliefs don't rely on the age of the earth. Does it hinder my faith? Nope. Does it take away any credibility of a higher being if the earth is millions/billions of years old? Nope. Does it take away or give any credibility to a God (or gods) if the earth is thousands of years old? Nope. In the end, that discussion is rather pointless.
  
  But, Apple, I do agree...there's a lot to religion that is centered around that.
• sleeper

  

  OSH;1792404 wrote:This is something I never really discuss. In the end, we'll never really know.
  
  There is absolutely zero proof we'll ever have in how "we got here" or "how the earth started." No one can verify it. No one was there. It's all theory. It's all faith in something -- science or belief system.
  
  I never get in discussions about "how old is the earth?" To me, it does nothing to prove or disprove anything. I don't know. I don't care. My thoughts and beliefs don't rely on the age of the earth. Does it hinder my faith? Nope. Does it take away any credibility of a higher being if the earth is millions/billions of years old? Nope. Does it take away or give any credibility to a God (or gods) if the earth is thousands of years old? Nope. In the end, that discussion is rather pointless.
  
  But, Apple, I do agree...there's a lot to religion that is centered around that.

  So what you are essentially saying is science and logic won't change your beliefs. You are also calling theories backed and tested by the scientific method as "faith".
  
  In other words, describing you as delusional would be putting it nicely.
• sleeper

  

  QuakerOats;1792387 wrote:Much of the essence of the debate.

  Except it's a cop out at best and in reality does nothing to justify, prove or support your entire belief system.
  
  There isn't much of a debate here. A lot of the "debate" is calling out indoctrinated, delusional religious believers on their lack of evidence, reason, and logic. I don't debate religion, I merely tell people what reality is. Reality and religion are like oil and water.
• QuakerOats

  sleeper;1792445 wrote:So what you are essentially saying is science and logic won't change your beliefs. You are also calling theories backed and tested by the scientific method as "faith".
  
  In other words, describing you as delusional would be putting it nicely.

  
  We get it; you do not believe in God. If you cannot see it, hear it, touch it; or add it and subtract it from your checkbook; it does not exist.
  
  Nonetheless, we will continue to include you in our prayers.
• sleeper

  

  Damn it, Sleeper. I had hoped to avoid getting into these discussions on here. Nobody's mind is ever changed, and they're a time-suck.

  
  The idea isn't to change your mind or change mine. The idea is to change the minds of the readers by presenting each other's arguments in the open marketplace of ideas.
  
  However, I am certainly open to having religious believers compete in the world of evidence and provide support to show their religious beliefs are real. We are still waiting but hopefully religious scholars 1,000 years from now will tell us what is real and what is not.
• sleeper

  

  QuakerOats;1792449 wrote:We get it; you do not believe in God. If you cannot see it, hear it, touch it; or add it and subtract it from your checkbook; it does not exist.
  
  Nonetheless, we will continue to include you in our prayers.

  You're delusional. Please seek professional help.
• sleeper

  

  I'm not disputing that at all. This is why it takes more than an unpacked nugget able to be regurgitated in a 15 minute post. I just suggested that those were reasons to support the foundation of any ideational worldview. The process is more like building a structure than just grabbing a few facts here and there and throwing them into a milieu of "supports" or "defeaters."
  
  All that to say that I'm not saying that the two things I mentioned were supports for the deity of the Judeo-Christian Bible. Merely that in order to arrive at the notion that there is any validity to the things you've mentioned, you first have to see sufficient grounds for a creator at all. Otherwise the rest is moot.

  I would agree with this. The first step in establishing the belief in ANY supreme being, regardless of religious affiliations, is establishing the validity of a creator. That's been argued and debated and their is some logic that I can refute entirely as pure garbage so okay.
  
  However, the reality is, their is zero evidence of any real world religion being correct. It's a theory at best and with theories you don't sit around and have scholars try to understand the Bible, a static book, you test the evidence for that theory and try to prove your point. Religion doesn't even bother doing this and instead relies entirely on fear and ignorance to continue the belief system.
  
  I just want to repeat again, that any man made religion is a hypothesis and not fact. It's also a hypothesis that no one bothers to actual test. Want to cut the shit about mocking religion? Go do what every other theory does and prove it.