Do you believe in the supernatural?

Birdjaguar said:
Intelligent life elsewhere in the universe "breaks" the Bible; that is why there is so much quibbling about proof and probability.
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I've heard some Christians argue that it wouldn't necessarily break the Bible. Rather the aliens would be lacking souls and thus be "sub-human" for not being God's chosen creation. Therefore no matter how intelligent, according to Christians, we aught to treat them like animals since that is what God laid out in the hierarchy of things.
 
EgonSpengler said:
Right, every once in a while, we discover something that changes our understanding. And I think in almost every case, it expands the possibilities rather than shrinks them. For example, when bacteria were discovered around a hydrothermal vent on the ocean floor that were using chemosynthesis (I was surprised to find that this was in 1977 when I looked it up just now, I thought it was more recent than that). Or when the Hubble telescope expanded our estimate of the number of stars in the universe, I think by a factor of 10.
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In counter-point, each discovery that expands the possibilities means that there's another unknown variable shrinking it back down to "it might be zero". If planets were rare, for example, that would have made the scientists of yesteryear think "it might not be the rarity of the initial abiogensis, afterall". But now with a gazillion stars plus even more old red dwarfs, plus something like a 50% chance of a star having a planetary system ... well, that excuse is starting to disappear.
 
I remember a high school philosophy class. We discussed extreterrestial intelligent life shortly and I noted that our understanding of ourselves, and philosophy, would probably have to took a real hard look at itself if we found someone else. The teacher agreed, a student disagreed. Then we moved on to the actual topic.

Just a regular high school discussion, really. It's not that novel an idea. I still think it's true, to some extent. A lot of older philosophy is rooted in a very anthropocentric (and Christian) worldview. The discomfort with abiogenesis (or heck, even biogenesis) reflects it too.
 
Joij21 said:
I've heard some Christians argue that it wouldn't necessarily break the Bible. Rather the aliens would be lacking souls and thus be "sub-human" for not being God's chosen creation. Therefore no matter how intelligent, according to Christians, we aught to treat them like animals since that is what God laid out in the hierarchy of things.
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Oh god, this is like the ultimate othering. The way some people act towards humans, this notion scares me.
 
El_Machinae said:
In counter-point, each discovery that expands the possibilities means that there's another unknown variable shrinking it back down to "it might be zero". If planets were rare, for example, that would have made the scientists of yesteryear think "it might not be the rarity of the initial abiogensis, afterall". But now with a gazillion stars plus even more old red dwarfs, plus something like a 50% chance of a star having a planetary system ... well, that excuse is starting to disappear.
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Right, I think that's "the Great Filter" hypothesis.
 
Birdjaguar said:
Intelligent life elsewhere in the universe "breaks" the Bible; that is why there is so much quibbling about proof and probability.
Click to expand...

Does it though? Does it say in the Bible that God doesn't have other covenants with other intelligent life elsewhere? I've read the whole bible (or an abridged version perhaps) and I don't remember anything like that, I remember it being pretty human-centric.. i.e. the story of humanity's relationship with the trinity. Who's to say that all the other alien civilizations don't have their own versions of the Bible with everything explained from their point of view? I mean, how do you sell "walking on water" to a species of intelligent dolphins, let alone a hyperdimensional insect that lives at the centre of a gas giant?

All I'm saying is.. If Christianity is actually true.. you bet all the alien civilizations out there have their own Bibles. Of course God would want to reach out to them too, why would we be so special? He's God, he can reach out to as many of his creations as he wants. He seems to have created trillions upon trillions of galaxies in the visible part of this universe alone.. why wouldn't he have created a whole bunch of life everywhere? Why would he only be interested in monkeys? That doesn't make sense to me. If Christianity is true, then the creator would want to reach out to everyone, and not just us. And that means targeted marketing in a language you can understand. In our case that means a guy getting nailed to the cross. In the case of aliens on Alpha Centauri it could mean something else entirely.
 
warpus said:
Does it though? Does it say in the Bible that God doesn't have other covenants with other intelligent life elsewhere? I've read the whole bible (or an abridged version perhaps) and I don't remember anything like that, I remember it being pretty human-centric.. i.e. the story of humanity's relationship with the trinity. Who's to say that all the other alien civilizations don't have their own versions of the Bible with everything explained from their point of view? I mean, how do you sell "walking on water" to a species of intelligent dolphins, let alone a hyperdimensional insect that lives at the centre of a gas giant?

All I'm saying is.. If Christianity is actually true.. you bet all the alien civilizations out there have their own Bibles. Of course God would want to reach out to them too, why would we be so special? He's God, he can reach out to as many of his creations as he wants. He seems to have created trillions upon trillions of galaxies in the visible part of this universe alone.. why wouldn't he have created a whole bunch of life everywhere? Why would he only be interested in monkeys? That doesn't make sense to me. If Christianity is true, then the creator would want to reach out to everyone, and not just us. And that means targeted marketing in a language you can understand. In our case that means a guy getting nailed to the cross. In the case of aliens on Alpha Centauri it could mean something else entirely.
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Alien life does not break Christianity, only the Bible. Christianity overall has adapted pretty well to changing times and reinterpreted its source material as need for the times.

The Bible is pretty clear on several points:
  • Jesus was the one and only son of god
  • He manifested on our planet
  • Genesis offers us only one world, one Garden, one Fall from grace
  • The second coming is the end of things
Of course, Christianity can decide that the Bible is only part of the story and God left lots out and that it is no longer a fully reliable source. YEC are a smaller group than in the past and if aliens are found then more changes will come.
 
warpus said:
you bet all the alien civilizations out there have their own Bibles.
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Yeah, except if a bunch of alien civilizations each have their own texts of a monotheistic god, how would you even know they were all referring to the Christian god? You wouldn't. It would be as futile as looking at other ancient societies here on Earth, look at Aten and Ahura Mazda, then conclude that both the Egyptians as well as Persians must have both believed in that Yahweh guy too! They may be similar but they clearly are not the same.
 
Birdjaguar said:
Alien life does not break Christianity, only the Bible. Christianity overall has adapted pretty well to changing times and reinterpreted its source material as need for the times.

The Bible is pretty clear on several points:
  • Jesus was the one and only son of god
  • He manifested on our planet
  • Genesis offers us only one world, one Garden, one Fall from grace
  • The second coming is the end of things
Of course, Christianity can decide that the Bible is only part of the story and God left lots out and that it is no longer a fully reliable source. YEC are a smaller group than in the past and if aliens are found then more changes will come.
Click to expand...

Interestingly, the stres on the last part (second coming) is actually not that popular outside the US.
 
I'm confused on why this thread is now a "do aliens exist" thread.
 
If your thinking about us earthers meeting aliens, maybe it'll be like discovering the new world and it's population?

Just keep an open mind, anything is possible! And I mean ANYTHING!
 
abradley said:
If your thinking about us earthers meeting aliens, maybe it'll be like discovering the new world and it's population?

Just keep an open mind, anything is possible! And I mean ANYTHING!
Click to expand...
More likely it would be like meeting group of octopi and trying to communicate with them. Actually, they are smart enough and curious enough that they would be a great place to begin interspecies communication. They separated so far in the past (500 million years ago) from the yet to become vertebrates that their brains and nervous systems developed independently from our side. They are true aliens to us.
 
Joij21 said:
Yeah, except if a bunch of alien civilizations each have their own texts of a monotheistic god, how would you even know they were all referring to the Christian god? .
Click to expand...

We don't have to know anything, so you're right, we might not know. But if God really exists, he would know. Why do we have to know that the Dolphin Klingons worship the same God as our Christians do? We don't. From the pov of this God, all we have to care about is our version of the story, and what it means for us.

But wouldn't we know? I mean, if we studied these alien Bibles, they would put forth the same values that our Bible puts forth. The same ideas of neighourly love and redemption and so on, just presented differently for another species.
 
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