Church + science = ...not creationism?

This is not news.

It's been known for some time now that the Vatican isn't against the idea of alien life.
 
As it stands now, I think that liberal views of religion are the more outdated ones.
 
Insisting that all religious people are creationists etc...
 
Higlac said:
Insisting that all religious people are creationists etc...
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Very true. I happen to believe in God but I also think the theory of evolution is the best logical and scientific explanation of how we got here. (Faith has always been about WHY we are here and not how for me).
 
Sulkdodds said:
When is a how not also a why?
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Ok, let me pose a question: Would you say that the how and why are the same for other things? Say, murder?

How did you kill her?

I stabbed her.

Why did you kill her?

Because I could.

I will always hold to my opinion that the Universe was not created by chance. The Universe is infinitely complex and to say that it formed this way by chance is an insult to my intelligence.
 
"How did she die" is a much more comprehensive question than "what specific methods were used to murder her." This sounds like semantics, but it is not. What causes impelled the man to pick up his knife? What were the causes of those causes? These are the proper hows, and they are also causal whys.
 
Shit, religion thread. *Gtfo*

lord_raken, I find myself to have similar thoughts as you.
 
True enough, but from all of the evidence that I've seen about the beginning of the universe and of the creation of life, I have never seen an answer to the question "Why did it happen?" In that aspect the how is not a why. Until science can synthesize a self-replicating, self-repairing molecule from base elements I will always maintain that life and the universe were not created by chance.
 
You seem to be pushing at the idea of Why, in the sense of a conscious, decision making process; as if ultimately things must begin with a conscious act.

If you ask how the universe came to be from nothing, then you can direct the same question at God or any sort of creator thing.
I'm not opposed to the idea of a being that created the universe, but if it does, I don't think it's really anything like what any religion I'm familiar with describes.
 
Life is just a bunch of matter and chemical reactions and so is the universe.

There has to be something. There cannot be absolutely nothing. So we have space. Empty space everywhere. This is the universe.

Gravity (an effect stemming from the existence of matter), combined with the chemical reactions of matter, like the explosive reactions of a star, and other deep space phenomena (example Pulsar), and you get matter everywhere, effected by the laws of physics. This forms galaxies.

You ever play with one of those magnetic art pads? This is the explanation to the entire universe and everything in it:

woolywillyopt.jpg
 
Farrowlesparrow said:
You seem to be pushing at the idea of Why, in the sense of a conscious, decision making process; as if ultimately things must begin with a conscious act.

If you ask how the universe came to be from nothing, then you can direct the same question at God or any sort of creator thing.
I'm not opposed to the idea of a being that created the universe, but if it does, I don't think it's really anything like what any religion I'm familiar with describes.
Click to expand...

Let's set some guidlines. Can we agree that the Universe is infinitely complex? Or at least current evidence points that way?
 
Just chemical reactions and matter.

Before science, we might have thought because we can't see something that it isn't there. Because we didn't hear anything that there was no sound.

We are extremely limited and tuned to a very specific range when it comes to our senses.

However, with scientific instruments, we can measure light frequencies that are invisible, sounds that are out of our hearing range, and we can measure magnetism, and all the waves from long wave, to gamma-ray.

Most all of you probably know this, but I'm putting it here anyway:

377px-Electromagnetic-Spectrum.png


The very small sliver in the middle labeled "Visible" (enlarged on the right in color) is all we can see. So, without technology, we wouldn't even know everything else was there.

Not only can we only see a tiny portion of the electromagnetic spectrum, without scientific instruments like microscopes, we wouldn't be able to see nor understand matter; like atoms and molecules and how they work.

So don't go start thinking the universe is magic, we are just not tuned to everything. That would require a very complex brain that (at least so far) hasn't been necessary for survival.

Blah blah blah Survival was of the fittest. The ones that survived spread their genes. Goes for all species, and I think we all know the story from there.
 
VirusType2 said:
Life is just a bunch of matter and chemical reactions and so is the universe.

There has to be something. There cannot be absolutely nothing. So we have space. Empty space everywhere. This is the universe.

Gravity (an effect stemming from the existence of matter), combined with the chemical reactions of matter, like the explosive reactions of a star, and other deep space phenomena (example Pulsar), and you get matter everywhere, effected by the laws of physics. This forms galaxies.

You ever play with one of those magnetic art pads? This is the explanation to the entire universe and everything in it:

woolywillyopt.jpg
Click to expand...

I've never heard it explained that way--and for that, I'm giving you a star sticker--actually, have the whole pack!

star_stickers_new_large.jpg


I am very happy that the Vatican has become so forward thinking in the past decade. There are still some problems, but there has been good progress.

One question though: are they still telling developing countries to not use condoms because it's sinful?
 
We will never be able to fully understand the universe.
 
Captain M4d said:
One question though: are they still telling developing countries to not use condoms because it's sinful?
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Thats a misconception actually. I believe they were telling the people not to use condoms with their wives rather than to stop the whole thing.
 
You're going to have to show your working there, I think.

Or are you just content to use the "infinity" of the universe to add "infinitely" to any statement you like?
 
If you roll an infinite number of dice, what are the odds that they will fall sequentially?

Where dice are the many particulars and devices that exist in the universe, and the outcome is that they all happened by fair chance.
 
Higlac said:
We will never be able to fully understand the universe.
Click to expand...
I believe that's correct. Our current brain is no where near powerful enough to comprehend everything.

Our brain has a significantly weaker short term memory than that of even a very young chimp. It also doesn't help that the life span of a human is an insignificant blip in the span of time (which is infinite), since matter is not destroyed.

Someone with increased brain power through chance genetics, like Einstein, give us a better chance of understanding more, yet still, yes - the universe is very complex, but not infinitely so. The universe may or may not be infinite, but I don't think it is infinitely complex. We'll see the same forces at work throughout the universe.


An obvious problem is that we are so incredibly far away from the various things in space that we don't understand. Not to mention that these things we don't understand are the most destructive forces in the universe. Galaxy destroyers. Kind of a dangerous subject for study.

However, no one person has to know everything; we can coordinate our efforts.

But I don't know if understanding it all will be obtainable. Also, why would we need to understand everything? For the comfort of saying, "we understand everything"?

Mostly, if something isn't necessary, it's almost impossible to get through evolution. This is because it isn't necessary for survival. If it was, then people with increased brain power would be the only ones to survive, and thus would be all that was left of mankind.
 
Higlac said:
From this we can infer that it is infinitely unlikely that the universe happened by chance.
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I'd say the opposite is true. But even so, it takes a big gap in thinking to go from one statement to the other. I just don't see the link at all.


I'm sure it's possible that the universe was created by a conscious being, but I don't see any reasoning that would actually suggest that.
 
I see the possibility of something grander more probable (though not necessarily likely). Something like, the universe being a small part of something much larger. Something that may not even be possible to discover due to the fragility of life.
 
Higlac said:
If you roll an infinite number of dice, what are the odds that they will fall sequentially?

Where dice are the many particulars and devices that exist in the universe, and the outcome is that they all happened by fair chance.
Click to expand...

I believe this reasoning is somewhat flawed.

If you were to say "if it happened again would it all turn out the same" then sure - your reasoning would be (somewhat kinda not really) fine.

However, this is not the only possibility that could have happened. Just because I might have a 6 sided die with 2 sides blank doesn't mean that I have a 1/6 chance of the die showing something - it means I have a 2/3 chance of something happening, 1/3 chance of something not happening, and a 1/36 chance of rolling two sixes in a row.

Now take that die and take the limit as the # of sides approach infinity. Same idea, much bigger # of chances. Much lower chance of getting "two sixes", which would be an exact repeat of the same universe.

With your "sequentially" argument, and like Sulkdodds is implying - there may have been millions of "sequences" that would produce at least one planet with intelligent life. We just happened to roll this one.
 
Kinslayer said:
With your "sequentially" argument, and like Sulkdodds is implying - there may have been millions of "sequences" that would produce at least one planet with intelligent life. We just happened to roll this one.
Click to expand...

An intriguing statement.

The chance that everything happened the way it did, well, things could have happened much differently, yet we would be saying the same thing.

"What are the odds of things happening this way again?" Even if things were completely different, we'd be saying the same thing: "What are the odds of things happening this way again?"

And if things happened much differently, then maybe I wouldn't be here do consider it. Or maybe life on Earth, or even Earth itself wouldn't be here, so we wouldn't be able to consider it.

It's the same thing where people think "what are the odds that I was the sperm that made it?" Well, no point in considering that, here you are. If not, it would have been someone else instead of you, or no one at all.

The Universe would certainly still be here. It doesn't care about us. We just happen to be capable of witnessing it and considering it.

That's maybe the 1st rule of life: all life wants to live. Even things without a brain have ways of ensuring survival, because it's of the utmost importance for survival. In other words, without that most basic instinct, the creature would not have made it. And so, until something can stop it, life will continue to live.
 
Just like society evolves, religion must evolve if it wants to not be forgotten. If religion does not evolve, people will not accept it, and it will be forgotten.
 
dream431ca said:
Just like society evolves, religion must evolve if it wants to not be forgotten. If religion does not evolve, people will not accept it, and it will be forgotten.
Click to expand...

Exactly

This stinks of a way to keep ahead of the curve for the first time in the churches history.. so if and when extraterrestrial life is discovered the church can say hay look we were part of it and here is why this shouldn't affect your belief in god.... or your donations!
 
Religion evolving is really just the god of the gaps.

Now that no (sane) person can deny evolution due to the mountains of evidence they just demote their god from the guy who made each and every organism to the guy who just keeps an eye of evolution and tweaks it every now and again.
 
It's still better than fundies trying to have their bullshit taught in science classrooms.
 
Remus said:
This is not news.

It's been known for some time now that the Vatican isn't against the idea of alien life.
Click to expand...

That's because they ARE Aliens god dammit.

Isn't it obvious? They're trying to get us accustomed to the idea for when they come and reveal themselves.
 
Avoidist said:
For Virus: Anthropic Principle.
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Wow, this is great, thanks. I've never heard of it.

It's kind of funny, I took the first line "There can't be nothing, there has to be something" from a Wu-Tang Clan song intermission I heard about 10 years ago. It really compelled me and I've always thought about it.

So then I modified it - "There can't be nothing, there has to be something, so we have empty space - The Universe" (because what do you expect, a skybox? A wall at the edge of universe?) It came to me from thinking about it in this very thread, and I was just using logic and known facts to put all the pieces together. I was very satisfied with myself about it.

This part sounds very similar to what I was thinking, and also considers a multiverse possibility (which is a common idea I learned of in science fiction movies):
Carter defined two forms of the Anthropic Principle, a "weak" one which referred only to anthropic selection of privileged spacetime locations in the universe, and a more controversial "strong" form which addressed the values of the fundamental constants of physics.

Roger Penrose explained the weak form as follows:

"The argument can be used to explain why the conditions happen to be just right for the existence of (intelligent) life on the earth at the present time. For if they were not just right, then we should not have found ourselves to be here now, but somewhere else, at some other appropriate time. This principle was used very effectively by Brandon Carter and Robert Dicke to resolve an issue that had puzzled physicists for a good many years. The issue concerned various striking numerical relations that are observed to hold between the physical constants (the gravitational constant, the mass of the proton, the age of the universe, etc.). A puzzling aspect of this was that some of the relations hold only at the present epoch in the earth's history, so we appear, coincidentally, to be living at a very special time (give or take a few million years!). This was later explained, by Carter and Dicke, by the fact that this epoch coincided with the lifetime of what are called main-sequence stars, such as the sun. At any other epoch, so the argument ran, there would be no intelligent life around in order to measure the physical constants in question-so the coincidence had to hold, simply because there would be intelligent life around only at the particular time that the coincidence did hold!"
—The Emperor's New Mind, Chapter 10

One reason this is plausible is that there are many other places and times in which we can imagine finding ourselves. But when applying the strong principle, we only have one Universe, with one set of fundamental parameters, so what exactly is the point being made? Carter offers two possibilities: First, we can use our own existence to make "predictions" about the parameters. But second, "as a last resort", we can convert these predictions into explanations by assuming that there is more than one Universe, in fact a large and possibly infinite collection of universes, something that is now called a multiverse ("world ensemble" was Carter's term), in which the parameters (and perhaps the laws of physics) vary across universes. The strong principle then becomes an example of a selection effect, exactly analogous to the weak principle. Postulating a multiverse is certainly a radical step, but taking it could provide at least a partial answer to a question which had seemed to be out of the reach of normal science: "why do the fundamental laws of physics take the particular form we observe and not another?"
Click to expand...

Haven't read the whole thing yet. Seems like the Anthropic Principle is a very general one - there's many different and opposing theories under this label. Unfortunately, my highest level of science education was High School Chemistry, so much of this, especially the introductory paragraphs, are over my head right now.
 
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