152 replies to this topic

[HavocWing]

Frank Merton, on 23 January 2013 - 07:13 AM, said:

What you sew is what you reap.

I'm still waiting for them to reap the sorrow the sew.

[Frank Merton]

HavocWing, on 23 January 2013 - 02:02 PM, said:

I'm still waiting for them to reap the sorrow the sew.

Yes and sometimes it seems we wait forever.  Maybe in the end there is no justice.  Still, I think the evidence says things generally and at least approximately do balance out.  People who do good turns to others get good turns done back to them.  Now this is not a reason to do good turns, just an observation.  People who commit crimes sooner or later end up arrested and imprisoned.

I know a once wealthy man who lived nearby and who made his fortune exploiting Vietnam's native trees illegally and to great harm to the environment.  I need not go into too much detail spelling out how he eventually was destroyed.

Sometimes our rewards are nothing more than self-worth and pride, sometimes our punishments are nothing more than guilt or shame or fear.  They all serve to balance the scale.

[ohioguy74]

I believe in god.

[AquilaChrysaetos]

Frank Merton, on 23 January 2013 - 02:14 PM, said:

People who commit crimes sooner or later end up arrested and imprisoned.

Not always unfortunately... Not always...

[Mr Walker]

Zaphod222, on 23 January 2013 - 05:15 AM, said:

With thousands of religions that we know of, I am impressed by your claim that you have studied all of them. Hard to believe though.
But I see now what you mean by the origin of religions that you talked about before is simply the innate willingness of people to accept irrational belief systems. Sure, that is part of of human psychology. I don´t think anybody argued against that.

But your claim that somehow all religions are related or even compatible is and remains pure wishful thinking. The belief systems that different people accept (or have to accept, in case of theocracies) are vastly different.

Oh yes. But tha tis not what I was talking about, at least. I was talking about the nature, form, and function of religious codification of spiritual beliefs. Like i said in an earlier post. Each book has a different content, yet all books are the same, basically,  in nature /form and function/purpose.

[Mr Walker]

The Silver Thong, on 23 January 2013 - 05:20 AM, said:

Who created god. the only answer that is plasauble is man as man exsisted before a god was created.

If you speak of god as a physical being then god  certainly existed before man, because god is a more evolved and older being than man. Only as man evolved self awarenes could he recognise and categorise gods.  This is the same for all physical forms in man's environment. Eg, trees/birds existed before man but man only recognised catalogued named and gave parameters to trees/birds as we evolved the abilty to do so.

If you speak of gods constructed by humans, then humans lived first, and created those gods out of their sapient self aware thought processes. BUT there will be earlier evolved sapient beings on other planets around the galaxy who conceived the concepes of god befoe humans were evolved into their present form also And thus, even the concept of god predates humanity.

[Frank Merton]

AquilaChrysaetos, on 25 January 2013 - 04:28 AM, said:

Not always unfortunately... Not always...

Yes, we know this; the point is not that consequences always follow, but that they generally do.  Criminals get away with it a few times, and as a result their minds are altered into thinking they will always get away with it, but sooner or later their luck ends.

Even when they are never caught, nature still punishes them, in various ways depending on the person.  It may be fear every time they hear a siren, or guilt or shame or abandonment by friends, or just living in a brutal society that is never a source of happiness.

[Tor_Hershman]

I know that there is(are) no meaningful god(s) or devil(s) as I state in this video.



http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_m6qC6FCiY0

[modas]

I believe in is science, but the question for me is what created science? Because there has to be something what created science. as the drawing if there is sheath of paper but no artist its never going to be the work of art. but it's only my opinion.
hope this makes any sense.

[Rlyeh]

modas, on 28 January 2013 - 10:01 AM, said:

I believe in is science, but the question for me is what created science? Because there has to be something what created science. as the drawing if there is sheath of paper but no artist its never going to be the work of art. but it's only my opinion.
hope this makes any sense.

Humans created science.

[modas]

Quote

Humans created science.

not the universe.

[Rlyeh]

modas, on 28 January 2013 - 10:10 AM, said:

not the universe.

You didn't say the universe, you said science.

[modas]

Rlyeh, on 28 January 2013 - 10:21 AM, said:

You didn't say the universe, you said science.

science includes everything from elements of the periodic table to nature from physics to universe and it allways was there but humans discovered it and made use out of it.
souch as use of metal, combining metal and stuff like that so i hope you get my point.

Edited by modas, 29 January 2013 - 11:54 AM.

[Rlyeh]

modas, on 29 January 2013 - 11:52 AM, said:

science includes everything from elements of the periodic table to nature from physics to universe and it allways was there but humans discovered it and made use out of it.
souch as use of metal, combining metal and stuff like that so i hope you get my point.

Science is the knowledge and understanding derived from such phenomena, science comes from the latin word "scientia" which means knowledge.

[Frank Merton]

Defining "science" is an interesting exercise in futility.  While a word generally translated "knowledge" is its origin, it does not mean "knowledge."

The best definition I have seen is, "The thing that scientists do."  That captures the essence that science is not a thing but a process.  Of course, one ends up going round the circle when one is forced to define "scientist" as, "an expert at doing science."

I think of science as common sense -- organized, institutionalized and taught in universities.