XenoFish Posted July 2, 2019 #26 Share Posted July 2, 2019 Just now, danydandan said: We start going down the rabbit hole of what defines life, we'd never get out of it. Isn't that the point. We consider ourselves alive, but what if life doesn't exist? Just organic molecules doing what they do. We call ourselves alive because we think we are. Maybe we're not. 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
XenoFish Posted July 2, 2019 #27 Share Posted July 2, 2019 Considering that we are more than likely just organic machines with no free will and live by the illusion of self. I'm beginning to think that there is absolutely nothing special about us. Just delusion animals. 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
+Hammerclaw Posted July 2, 2019 #28 Share Posted July 2, 2019 In a Universe brimming with organic compounds, life is just as natural as anything else in it. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guyver Posted July 3, 2019 #29 Share Posted July 3, 2019 5 hours ago, XenoFish said: Just because we are animated doesn't mean life. If that's the case then my truck is 'alive'. I think it is safe to consider your truck not alive because it has no instinct for survival. That instinct for survival seems consistent with every living thing....maybe that is a good definition? 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Rlyeh Posted July 3, 2019 #30 Share Posted July 3, 2019 11 hours ago, Pettytalk said: How does one go about to show the hand of God to a one cell life form? The same way you support your other claims, you don't. You ramble, make empty claims, but to show? That's even too much for you. 11 hours ago, Pettytalk said: Pretty much the same simile for showing the hand of God to the one human with the highest IQ possible. Where does it leave all those lesser scoring ones? Why in that specualtive pool where life has not even formed yet! Such a high IQ he's incapable of starting the test let alone finishing it. 11 hours ago, Pettytalk said: Let science create life from all the known elements, or any combinations thereof, using all the known technology and I will bend my knees and worship science till there is no tomorrow. Still comparing science, a method of investigation, to an absent deity. 7 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Grim Reaper 6 Posted July 3, 2019 #31 Share Posted July 3, 2019 11 hours ago, Pettytalk said: How to make points around here? Cater to the populars and one will accumulate plenty of points. How does one go about to show the hand of God to a one cell life form? Pretty much the same simile for showing the hand of God to the one human with the highest IQ possible. Where does it leave all those lesser scoring ones? Why in that specualtive pool where life has not even formed yet! Let science create life from all the known elements, or any combinations thereof, using all the known technology and I will bend my knees and worship science till there is no tomorrow. Notice that I'm giving science much of everything to work with, whereas God created all from nothing. They say God works in mysterious ways, maybe god caused the formation of life in those pools. Maybe god is guiding science in the direction it is going in. Even the Vatican is acknowledging scientific views on some subjects. I don't think science dispells God I think they walk hand in hand. 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Rlyeh Posted July 3, 2019 #32 Share Posted July 3, 2019 (edited) 1 hour ago, Manwon Lender said: They say God works in mysterious ways, maybe god caused the formation of life in those pools. Maybe god is guiding science in the direction it is going in. Even the Vatican is acknowledging scientific views on some subjects. I don't think science dispells God I think they walk hand in hand. That's basically the god of gaps. Science definitely dispels the Abrahamic deity, but people refuse to let go. Edited July 3, 2019 by Rlyeh 7 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
danydandan Posted July 3, 2019 #33 Share Posted July 3, 2019 8 hours ago, XenoFish said: Isn't that the point. We consider ourselves alive, but what if life doesn't exist? Just organic molecules doing what they do. We call ourselves alive because we think we are. Maybe we're not. This where I bring my favorite French dude into the mix, Cogito ergo sum. 4 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Grim Reaper 6 Posted July 3, 2019 #34 Share Posted July 3, 2019 1 hour ago, Rlyeh said: That's basically the god of gaps. Science definitely dispels the Abrahamic deity, but people refuse to let go. It may be, but I think that is as close as it can get. take care Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
eight bits Posted July 3, 2019 Author #35 Share Posted July 3, 2019 11 hours ago, danydandan said: We start going down the rabbit hole of what defines life, we'd never get out of it. There are all sorts of things where "definitions" are shaky, but "we know it when we see it," like art, pornography, injustice, preaching, etc. There typically are clear cases one way or the other, but no way to draw a bright and shining line neatly separating all the "yeses" from all the "noes." Maybe "life" is one of those terms, with clear cases one way (we are alive), clear cases the opposite way (some day none of us will be alive any more), and in between, cases where reasonable people can differ (viruses - and very likely "the earliest life form on Earth," whatever that turns out to be). I think the search for origins can move forward without a hard definition that may never come. In some ways the point of the project is to find a clear case of something not alive (a chemical soup) whose composition and behavior changes step by step until eventually there is a clear case of something that most observers would call "alive." At what step was the "transition" from something not-alive to alive accomplished? Meh, that's why God made philosophers 5 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Habitat Posted July 3, 2019 #36 Share Posted July 3, 2019 42 minutes ago, eight bits said: There are all sorts of things where "definitions" are shaky, but "we know it when we see it," like art, pornography, injustice, preaching, Really ? All those things are open to varying interpretation. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Stubbly_Dooright Posted July 3, 2019 #37 Share Posted July 3, 2019 20 hours ago, danydandan said: 23 hours ago, Stubbly_Dooright said: Seems to me, like it kind of doesn’t make sense. So, what is growing strong, is your thought of not knowing how it all began? Am I understanding that is your point? Sweet Caroline. And I thought, I knew my Neil Diamond songs! My bad. (I wanted to refer to a bit from an episode of “Whose Line is it Anyway” where Ryan Stiles talkers about how Neil Diamond always ends his lyrics with “Tonight!”, but I don’t think I can find one screenshot or something similar) 3 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Stubbly_Dooright Posted July 3, 2019 #38 Share Posted July 3, 2019 20 hours ago, Pettytalk said: How to make points around here? Cater to the populars and one will accumulate plenty of points. How does one go about to show the hand of God to a one cell life form? Pretty much the same simile for showing the hand of God to the one human with the highest IQ possible. Where does it leave all those lesser scoring ones? Why in that specualtive pool where life has not even formed yet! Let science create life from all the known elements, or any combinations thereof, using all the known technology and I will bend my knees and worship science till there is no tomorrow. Notice that I'm giving science much of everything to work with, whereas God created all from nothing. If I could use my experience growing up to counter this, (in my observational opinion) with no going to any religious meetings, reading fully religious books, and being lectured about what a higher power and their ‘relatives’ do or did, I could probably feel that I actually believe all that was taught to me in school, (even to me, the science) about how, and I say ‘how’ it’s been explained how life can start from various properties long ago. Believing that a higher power, or in the orthodox way of it being explained outside my childhood home, created life from nothing, didn’t see or hear or been lectured about it. Then, growing up, not really understanding how it can be believed, when I haven’t seen any way of explaining it further, (with examples and so forth). In a nutshell, I believe the science over religious, by one side over the other actually going forth and showing how it could be in an understandable way. 17 hours ago, danydandan said: Well all I know is my mammy and daddy had cuddles, and nine months later I escaped. I love that! Had cuddles! I really love that! 3 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Stubbly_Dooright Posted July 3, 2019 #39 Share Posted July 3, 2019 11 hours ago, Guyver said: 16 hours ago, XenoFish said: Just because we are animated doesn't mean life. If that's the case then my truck is 'alive'. I think it is safe to consider your truck not alive because it has no instinct for survival. That instinct for survival seems consistent with every living thing....maybe that is a good definition? It seems to me, every mechanical and electronic device, seems to have the instinct, no, hellbent on p***ing me off. (Not working, going slow, doing confusing **** at the most untimely moments) like they hate me or something! .......................... I am joking............ but maybe I have my own argument there! 5 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Piney Posted July 3, 2019 #40 Share Posted July 3, 2019 7 hours ago, Rlyeh said: Science definitely dispels the Abrahamic deity, but people refuse to let go. But not the Taoist concept that the Universe is a spiritual organism. 2 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
+Pettytalk Posted July 3, 2019 #41 Share Posted July 3, 2019 9 hours ago, danydandan said: This where I bring my favorite French dude into the mix, Cogito ergo sum. Just how do you bring him in? Do you like french fries? How are you serving your fish, fried or baked? If I remember my french, was not Descartes a logical believer in the soul and God? I think, therefore Descartes plagiarized from Socrates/Plato. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
+Pettytalk Posted July 3, 2019 #42 Share Posted July 3, 2019 We are all on an individual journey, and no one knows kust where we come from, nor where we are heading. And along the way we run into other lost souls, who tell us we are the ones lost. The truth is that we are all lost, lost in a lost world Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Piney Posted July 3, 2019 #43 Share Posted July 3, 2019 56 minutes ago, Pettytalk said: The truth is that we are all lost, lost in a lost world That's known as "projecting yourself on others". 6 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
danydandan Posted July 3, 2019 #44 Share Posted July 3, 2019 1 hour ago, Pettytalk said: Just how do you bring him in? Do you like french fries? How are you serving your fish, fried or baked? If I remember my french, was not Descartes a logical believer in the soul and God? I think, therefore Descartes plagiarized from Socrates/Plato. I see FrTed is in that video. You up for a game of chess? Nearly beat 2100+ player earlier this week. 2 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Coil Posted July 3, 2019 #45 Share Posted July 3, 2019 On 7/1/2019 at 11:56 AM, eight bits said: How life began Matter-Force forms aggregative states: Spoiler Matter is the presentation of force which is most easily intelligible to our intelligence, moulded as it is by contacts in Matter to which a mind involved in material brain gives the response. The elementary state of material Force is, in the view of the old Indian physicists, a condition of pure material extension in Space of which the peculiar property is vibration typified to us by the phenomenon of sound. But vibration in this state of ether is not sufficient to create forms. There must first be some obstruction in the flow of the Force ocean, some contraction and expansion, some interplay of vibrations, some impinging of force upon force so as to create a beginning of fixed relations and mutual effects. Material Force modifying its first ethereal status assumes a second, called in the old language the aerial, of which the special property is contact between force and force,contact that is the basis of all material relations. Still we have not as yet real forms but only varying forces. A sustaining principle is needed. This is provided by a third self-modification of the primitive Force of which the principle of light, electricity, fire and heat is for us the characteristic manifestation. Even then,we can have forms of force preserving their own character and peculiar action, but not stable forms of Matter. A fourth state characterised by diffusion and a first medium of permanent attractions and repulsions, termed picturesquely water or the liquid state, and a fifth of cohesion, termed earth or the solid state, complete the necessary elements.All forms of Matter of which we are aware, all physical things even to the most subtle, are built up by the combination of these five elements. Upon them also depends all our sensible ex-perience; for by reception of vibration comes the sense of sound;by contact of things in a world of vibrations of Force the sense of touch; by the action of light in the forms hatched, outlined,sustained by the force of light and fire and heat the sense of sight;by the fourth element the sense of taste; by the fifth the sense of smell. But the problem of consciousness is not solved by this theory; for it does not explain how the contact of the vibrations of the Force leads to the emergence of conscious sensations. Ancient thinkers believed in the existence of other worlds, which, perhaps, support life and consciousness in us or even cause them by their pressure, but these worlds themselves do not enter the material world. Nothing can evolve from Matter that is no longer contained in it. The Life Divine , Chapter X, Conscious Force https://www.urantiagaia.org/eng/spiritual/aurobindo/Aurobindo-TheLifeDivine.pdf Consciousness in the atom, its release and awakening: Spoiler In fact, life, mind, supermind are present in the atom, are at work there, but invisible, occult, latent in a subconscious or apparently unconscious action of the Energy; there is an informing Spirit, but the outer force and figure of being, what we might call the formal or form existence as distinguished from the immanent or secretly governing consciousness, is lost in the physical action, is so absorbed into it as to be fixed in a stereo-typed self-oblivion unaware of what it is and what it is doing.The electron and atom are in this view eternal somnambulists;each material object contains an outer or form consciousness involved, absorbed in the form, asleep, seeming to be an unconsciousness driven by an unknown and unfelt inner Existence, —he who is awake in the sleeper, the universal Inhabitant of the Upanishads, — an outer absorbed form-consciousness which,unlike that of the human somnambulist, has never been awakeand is not always or ever on the point of waking. In the plant this outer form-consciousness is still in the state of sleep, but a sleepfull of nervous dreams, always on the point of waking, but never waking. Life has appeared; in other words, force of concealed conscious being has been so much intensified, has raised itself to such a height of power as to develop or become capable of a new principle of action, that which we see as vitality, life-force. It has become vitally responsive to existence, though not mentally aware, and has put forth a new grade of activities of a higher and subtler value than any purely physical action. At the sametime, it is capable of receiving and turning into these new life-values, into motions and phenomena of a vibration of vitality,life-contacts and physical contacts from other forms than its own and from universal Nature. This is a thing which forms of mere matter cannot do; they cannot turn contacts into life-values or any kind of value, partly because their power of reception,— although it exists, if occult evidence is to be trusted, — is not sufficiently awake to do anything but dumbly receive and imperceptibly react, partly because the energies transmitted by the contacts are too subtle to be utilised by the crude in organic density of formed Matter. Life in the tree is determined by its physical body, but it takes up the physical existence and gives it a new value or system of values, — the life-value. The transition to the mind and sense that appear in the animal being, that which we call conscious life, is operated in the same manner. The force of being is so much intensified,rises to such a height as to admit or develop a new principle of existence, — apparently new at least in the world of Matter, —mentality. Animal being is mentally aware of existence, its own and others, puts forth a higher and subtler grade of activities,receives a wider range of contacts, mental, vital, physical,from forms other than its own, takes up the physical and vital existence and turns all it can get from them into sense values and vital-mind values. It senses body, it senses life, but it senses also mind; for it has not only blind nervous reactions, but conscious sensations, memories, impulses, volitions, emotions, mental associations, the stuff of feeling and thought and will. It has even a practical intelligence, founded on memory, association,stimulating need, observation, a power of device; it is capable of cunning, strategy, planning; it can invent, adapt to some extent its inventions, meet in this or that detail the demand of new circumstance. All is not in it a half-conscious instinct; the animal prepares human intelligence. Part 2, Chapter XVIII, The Evolutionary Process —Ascent and Integration https://www.urantiagaia.org/eng/spiritual/aurobindo/Aurobindo-TheLifeDivine.pdf - "The mechanical, mathematical, automatic law of things is a fact, but inside it there is a spiritual law of consciousness at work, which gives the inner turns and meaning to the mechanical steps of Natural forces, essential rightness and secretly conscious necessity, and above that there is spiritual freedom that knows and acts the supreme and universal truth of the Spirit." -"One Being, one Reality as the "I" founds, supports, informs, as Ishwara will, governs and has its world of manifestation, created and held in movement and action by its own Consciousness-Force or Self-Power - Maya, Prakriti, Shakti." -"He came to know that Matter is Brahman. It is he who is awake in those who are asleep". -"All things are self-unfolding of Divine Knowledge." 3 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
danydandan Posted July 3, 2019 #46 Share Posted July 3, 2019 21 minutes ago, Coil said: Matter-Force forms aggregative states: Reveal hidden contents Matter is the presentation of force which is most easily intelligible to our intelligence, moulded as it is by contacts in Matter to which a mind involved in material brain gives the response. The elementary state of material Force is, in the view of the old Indian physicists, a condition of pure material extension in Space of which the peculiar property is vibration typified to us by the phenomenon of sound. But vibration in this state of ether is not sufficient to create forms. There must first be some obstruction in the flow of the Force ocean, some contraction and expansion, some interplay of vibrations, some impinging of force upon force so as to create a beginning of fixed relations and mutual effects. Material Force modifying its first ethereal status assumes a second, called in the old language the aerial, of which the special property is contact between force and force,contact that is the basis of all material relations. Still we have not as yet real forms but only varying forces. A sustaining principle is needed. This is provided by a third self-modification of the primitive Force of which the principle of light, electricity, fire and heat is for us the characteristic manifestation. Even then,we can have forms of force preserving their own character and peculiar action, but not stable forms of Matter. A fourth state characterised by diffusion and a first medium of permanent attractions and repulsions, termed picturesquely water or the liquid state, and a fifth of cohesion, termed earth or the solid state, complete the necessary elements.All forms of Matter of which we are aware, all physical things even to the most subtle, are built up by the combination of these five elements. Upon them also depends all our sensible ex-perience; for by reception of vibration comes the sense of sound;by contact of things in a world of vibrations of Force the sense of touch; by the action of light in the forms hatched, outlined,sustained by the force of light and fire and heat the sense of sight;by the fourth element the sense of taste; by the fifth the sense of smell. But the problem of consciousness is not solved by this theory; for it does not explain how the contact of the vibrations of the Force leads to the emergence of conscious sensations. Ancient thinkers believed in the existence of other worlds, which, perhaps, support life and consciousness in us or even cause them by their pressure, but these worlds themselves do not enter the material world. Nothing can evolve from Matter that is no longer contained in it. The Life Divine , Chapter X, Conscious Force https://www.urantiagaia.org/eng/spiritual/aurobindo/Aurobindo-TheLifeDivine.pdf Consciousness in the atom, its release and awakening: Reveal hidden contents In fact, life, mind, supermind are present in the atom, are at work there, but invisible, occult, latent in a subconscious or apparently unconscious action of the Energy; there is an informing Spirit, but the outer force and figure of being, what we might call the formal or form existence as distinguished from the immanent or secretly governing consciousness, is lost in the physical action, is so absorbed into it as to be fixed in a stereo-typed self-oblivion unaware of what it is and what it is doing.The electron and atom are in this view eternal somnambulists;each material object contains an outer or form consciousness involved, absorbed in the form, asleep, seeming to be an unconsciousness driven by an unknown and unfelt inner Existence, —he who is awake in the sleeper, the universal Inhabitant of the Upanishads, — an outer absorbed form-consciousness which,unlike that of the human somnambulist, has never been awakeand is not always or ever on the point of waking. In the plant this outer form-consciousness is still in the state of sleep, but a sleepfull of nervous dreams, always on the point of waking, but never waking. Life has appeared; in other words, force of concealed conscious being has been so much intensified, has raised itself to such a height of power as to develop or become capable of a new principle of action, that which we see as vitality, life-force. It has become vitally responsive to existence, though not mentally aware, and has put forth a new grade of activities of a higher and subtler value than any purely physical action. At the sametime, it is capable of receiving and turning into these new life-values, into motions and phenomena of a vibration of vitality,life-contacts and physical contacts from other forms than its own and from universal Nature. This is a thing which forms of mere matter cannot do; they cannot turn contacts into life-values or any kind of value, partly because their power of reception,— although it exists, if occult evidence is to be trusted, — is not sufficiently awake to do anything but dumbly receive and imperceptibly react, partly because the energies transmitted by the contacts are too subtle to be utilised by the crude in organic density of formed Matter. Life in the tree is determined by its physical body, but it takes up the physical existence and gives it a new value or system of values, — the life-value. The transition to the mind and sense that appear in the animal being, that which we call conscious life, is operated in the same manner. The force of being is so much intensified,rises to such a height as to admit or develop a new principle of existence, — apparently new at least in the world of Matter, —mentality. Animal being is mentally aware of existence, its own and others, puts forth a higher and subtler grade of activities,receives a wider range of contacts, mental, vital, physical,from forms other than its own, takes up the physical and vital existence and turns all it can get from them into sense values and vital-mind values. It senses body, it senses life, but it senses also mind; for it has not only blind nervous reactions, but conscious sensations, memories, impulses, volitions, emotions, mental associations, the stuff of feeling and thought and will. It has even a practical intelligence, founded on memory, association,stimulating need, observation, a power of device; it is capable of cunning, strategy, planning; it can invent, adapt to some extent its inventions, meet in this or that detail the demand of new circumstance. All is not in it a half-conscious instinct; the animal prepares human intelligence. Part 2, Chapter XVIII, The Evolutionary Process —Ascent and Integration https://www.urantiagaia.org/eng/spiritual/aurobindo/Aurobindo-TheLifeDivine.pdf - "The mechanical, mathematical, automatic law of things is a fact, but inside it there is a spiritual law of consciousness at work, which gives the inner turns and meaning to the mechanical steps of Natural forces, essential rightness and secretly conscious necessity, and above that there is spiritual freedom that knows and acts the supreme and universal truth of the Spirit." -"One Being, one Reality as the "I" founds, supports, informs, as Ishwara will, governs and has its world of manifestation, created and held in movement and action by its own Consciousness-Force or Self-Power - Maya, Prakriti, Shakti." -"He came to know that Matter is Brahman. It is he who is awake in those who are asleep". -"All things are self-unfolding of Divine Knowledge." Not sure weather I should laugh or cry. 4 1 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
+Pettytalk Posted July 3, 2019 #47 Share Posted July 3, 2019 50 minutes ago, danydandan said: I see FrTed is in that video. You up for a game of chess? Nearly beat 2100+ player earlier this week. Does nearly count as a win? Still I'm impressed by your level of play with such a highly rated player. And I would enjoy a game of chess, even if you nearly beat me too. But can we wait till next Sunday to play, as I'm still at seaside till Saturday, and won't be able to concentrate on the game properly? 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
danydandan Posted July 3, 2019 #48 Share Posted July 3, 2019 3 minutes ago, Pettytalk said: Does nearly count as a win? Still I'm impressed by your level of play with such a highly rated player. And I would enjoy a game of chess, even if you nearly beat me too. But can we wait till next Sunday to play, as I'm still at seaside till Saturday, and won't be able to concentrate on the game properly? We drew, so nearest thing to a win. I'll challenge you next week so. 2 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
+Sherapy Posted July 4, 2019 #49 Share Posted July 4, 2019 On 7/1/2019 at 1:56 AM, eight bits said: Jack Szostak of Harvard and Massachusetts General Hospital has spent much of this century so far working on how the earliest chemical systems capable of participating in Darwinian evolution might have formed naturally on Earth. His work and career are profiled this month in the Harvard alumni magazine. https://harvardmagazine.com/2019/07/origin-life-earth First life remains an open problem, but progress has been made. Of the various possibilities under active investigation, Szostak favors the "something like RNA surrounded by a membrane" hypothesis. None of the serious contenders resembles the God-squad meme about how a vat of chemicals had to form up spontaneously to become a passenger jet, therefore godidit. Excellent article, I want to see progress in understanding more in the Neuroscience arena. I am gonna pass this article on to the lady I work for who is a Neurologist. 1 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Golden Duck Posted July 10, 2019 #50 Share Posted July 10, 2019 On 03/07/2019 at 2:50 AM, Pettytalk said: How to make points around here? Cater to the populars and one will accumulate plenty of points. Reputation point? Confused, ha-ha, sad, thanks or just a plain old like all count the same. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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