Existence of God (split from old thread)

[warpus]

But where would be the fun in that? Besides all-powerful means also to allow room for foolishness and weakness. I read: God plays a fool in season; Man plays a fool in season and out of season - that is the only difference. Also God may care about what the humans think of it yet there may be much more important realities beyond mind and thinking. And lastly if God would be so keen on everybody being in the same club I dont think the multiplicity in the universe and many-sided natural evolution would make much sense.

Yeah, the only way around it all is if God doesn't really care or God plays the fool or God has other more important things to worry about.

 

[Mechanicalsalvation]

I think I have found a philosophical evidence for existence of God:
Existence is in essence infinite which means the existence of an infinite consciousness which means the existence of God.

 

[Mechanicalsalvation]

Yeah, the only way around it all is if God doesn't really care or God plays the fool or God has other more important things to worry about.

But you have to be aware that God cant not to care simply becouse everything exists inside It. Or in other words like the video above points out everything is God.

 

[warpus]

I think I have found a philosophical evidence for existence of God:
Existence is in essence infinite which means the existence of an infinite consciousness which means the existence of God.

But that's just random words.

 

[Mechanicalsalvation]

But that's just random words.

Thanks but can you elaborate? I think the first premise that existence is infinite quite holds. Everything from there is a smooth sailing.

 

[Berzerker]

Anatomically modern humans are called homo sapiens sapiens, I am told.That's not really relevant though, as both are human.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anatomically_modern_human

Yes, and there are genetic traces of Neanderthals in modern humans. so you might say we 'merged'.

Merging doesn't produce traces... While its theorized some interbreeding happened when "we" entered into Neandertal lands, I haven't seen yet if some of our shared genes stem from an earlier split since African Erectus gave rise to both lines. There is evidence some anatomically modern humans did pick up more genes as they expanded into lands populated by prior waves of people, but they were already related to those people too.

Again, Eden might be 'located' anywhere.

The Bible located it for us... But if it was just a Garden and its been sitting under water for almost 10,000 years then I dont imagine we'd see much. And we're not sure when the Garden ceased being a Garden, it could have been defunct even further back in time.

 

[timtofly]

Again, Eden might be 'located' anywhere. It's as likely to be 'found' as Noah's ark. I'm not sure what Genesis has to do with humans discovering farming, which occurred at various places at various times. In Genesis God tells Adam to 'take care of the garden', so that would make him a gardener. There's no mention either in Genesis of an ice age - most likely because it's authors had no knowledge of such an event. If you want to make sense of mythical stories, you'd probably do best to study some mythology, instead of trying to take things literally. Neither Genesis or Exodus are counted among the biblical historical books. You may find a creation story among every religion on Earth. None of which makes any one of them factual.

Right, because the flood destroyed all traces if there had been any of Eden, and time has destroyed the ark. I bet they were located very close to each other though, and that would be greater Turkey. But then again that area has migrated up from the equator. Although, most will deny the crust has moved an inch......

Yeah, the only way around it all is if God doesn't really care or God plays the fool or God has other more important things to worry about.

That sounds like your take on humanity itself. Except that humanity is God doing earth. It would be the same concept as robots doing humans, except the concept does not compare to reality, as humans are not God, even if they wanted to be. They are just an image, and nothing else. And that may only be 1% of the time, and I am not referring to the 1% of humanity that "Lords" it over the rest. If humans were 100% God, we would be robots. If we let robots act like humans, we would not have done a very good job at creating our image, or would we?

 

[Berzerker]

because it's consistent with the scientific understanding of our world.

We dont have a scientific understanding of how life began

I'm saying that every culture is going to have myths of calamities, and the more basic and oldschool the calamity, the more likely a culture has one for that one, and one for that one, and that one.... floods, raining fire rocks, disease, etc, I would imagine most cultures have most/all of them.

No doubt... But in spite of all the floods people experienced only one stands out as the great flood. For example, imagine living in the Black Sea basin when the Mediterranean breached the Bosporus. Did that become their flood myth? Probably not, people to their south had been watching the Mediterranean rising for centuries before it got to the Black Sea. The Persian Gulf was apparently an extensive river valley fed by monsoons and glaciers for much of the ice age from 75-8 kya. The people living there saw it disappear under the water ~8,000 years ago. The Sunda Shelf and Bering land bridge were enormous stretches of land that became submerged, and I read an article recently about evidence of the flooding that created the British Isles. You wouldn't have wanted to be living in what is now the English Channel. How and when people were effected by the rising seas depended on geography. But I have little doubt the great flood was caused by the great meltdown.

the nature of God is known once we realize that foals die in forest fires.

 

[Agent327]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anatomically_modern_human

I'm not sure why the link?

Merging doesn't produce traces... While its theorized some interbreeding happened when "we" entered into Neandertal lands, I haven't seen yet if some of our shared genes stem from an earlier split since African Erectus gave rise to both lines. There is evidence some anatomically modern humans did pick up more genes as they expanded into lands populated by prior waves of people, but they were already related to those people too.

All hominids are related. That's basically why they are called 'human-like'.

The Bible located it for us... But if it was just a Garden and its been sitting under water for almost 10,000 years then I dont imagine we'd see much. And we're not sure when the Garden ceased being a Garden, it could have been defunct even further back in time.

The Bible doesn't locate anything of the sort. The reason we speak of 'historical books' in the Bible is that they can be corroborated with other sources. This doesn't apply to creation myths, in particular the Genesis one, which shows close affinity with earlier Sumerian creation mythology. Since you obviously didn't read up on mythology: myths may contain a kernel of factuality. Given the layers put over this possible kernel of factuality it is exceedingly difficult to determine such. That's not to say it's impossible: the Sumerian Gilgamesh epic is now deemed to refer to an actual 'king' Gilgamesh.. That, however, is not really possible with the Genesis story: it mentions no persons that might actually have existed. In other words, Genesis is not what one would call ' a reliable source'.

Now, you may personally believe anything you like. That, however, doesn't make your personal beliefs factual. There are other criteria for that:

Right, because the flood destroyed all traces if there had been any of Eden, and time has destroyed the ark. I bet they were located very close to each other though, and that would be greater Turkey. But then again that area has migrated up from the equator. Although, most will deny the crust has moved an inch......

Neither Eden nor Noah refer to anything historical. In fact, both the creation and the flood story in the Bible show close affinity with (earlier) Mesopotamian myths. and, as already mentioned, nobody has located either Eden or the ark.

 

[Berzerker]

Now how did I know you were going to go back to this nonsense? Nobody at the other forum believed you, and only timtofly supports your notions on this one, albeit in a really bizarre form.

Giants: Myth.

Tiamat: Myth.

Norse content: Myth (and I say this as someone whose ancestors believed that stuff)

Earth/asteroid belt: Unproven, and your link is still worthless. And no, I'm still not going to ask "my pal Lori" to come here and post; I repeat: his coming here was his own decision. I didn't ask him to do that.

I was responding to Angst, he mentioned Norse mythology. As for the other forum, one of the posters did confirm my math showing Saturn's rings pointing to Pluto near perihelion.

You mentioned Noah. The story of Noah includes animals.

I mentioned Noah planting a vineyard and getting drunk. You want to argue about animals instead as if I mentioned animals, I didn't. You have a habit of ignoring what I say and replacing it with your own arguments which you proceed to ridicule.

Your first link leads to an article that talks more about Paleolithic people than modern humans. It adds up to "Maybe. We need to excavate underwater." So nothing is conclusive in this article.

The 1st link gave a nice overview of the region from 75kya to 8kya when the Gulf formed and people rebuilt around it, but how are you defining modern? And "maybe" is all I need, I said its possible and you wanted a link - you got it.

Second link: Interesting, but it's 30 years old. The note at the bottom of the article makes me giggle:
I can't take this seriously. This is ridiculous.[/quote]

I posted the 2nd link because it talks about the archaeologist (and his theory) mentioned in the 3rd link

Third link

: The article is extremely short, and needs more citations.

He's an archaeologist who has argued the Persian Gulf covered Eden. You got your links and you dismissed them.

Y'know, climate change doesn't make things suddenly go POOF! and it's gone, at least not usually. Admittedly, things are pretty dire in parts of the Canadian Arctic, with some settlements that were built on permafrost now in danger of sinking. But nowadays we've got help from human-influenced climate change. That wasn't the case back then.

Depends on whats causing the climate change... But I wouldn't think eg the Bering land bridge disappeared over night, or even over a year or two. On the other hand, if the flood was accompanied by large tsunamis from an ocean impact coastal peoples wouldn't have had much if any warning. If a quake can kill a 1/4 million people in the blink of a geologic eye, imagine what a large chunk of rock (or several) falling into the ocean would do.

If you're going to bring Atlantis into this, why not PM the "Ask an Atlanteologist" poster and get him back? I've still got questions from those videos he told me to watch, but didn't stick around long enough to answer them.

Do you want me to ask him your questions too? You dont need me to track him down.

Archaeology isn't like Indiana Jones or the old Relic Hunter TV show.

Tia Carrere should've been Lara Croft

 

[Berzerker]

I'm not sure why the link?

When I mentioned anatomically modern humans you complained because you were told about homo sapien sapiens. So I provided a link showing the phrase anatomically modern humans comes from the people researching human evolution.

All hominids are related. That's basically why they are called 'human-like'.

Did I say they weren't related? I said the anatomically modern humans (leaving Africa) were related to the people who had left Africa even earlier. My question was about when we acquired our shared DNA, eg with Neandertals. Maybe some of it came from our erectus ancestors before various groups left Africa. So when researchers say we have a bit of Neandertal in us, does that mean we picked it up recently or was some of it shared by virtue of our erectus ancestry.

 

[Perfection]

We dont have a scientific understanding of how life began

We have a scientific understanding of how the universe works and the natural history of Earth. So while we don't have a complete scientific understanding of how life began, we can assess theories based on those metrics. Theories like God creating life which posit extraphysical forces (violating physical law) run counter to established scientific theory without sufficient compensatory explanatory power.

 

[Agent327]

He's an archaeologist who has argued the Persian Gulf covered Eden. You got your links and you dismissed them.

So your source for claiming the location of Eden is 1 person. That's neither very convincing, nor is it really how science works. There are quite a few people who claimed to have found (the remains of) Noah's ark; that doesn't make it fact though.

When I mentioned anatomically modern humans you complained because you were told about homo sapien sapiens. So I provided a link showing the phrase anatomically modern humans comes from the people researching human evolution.

I didn't 'complain', I clarified. And I'm aware where the term anatomically modern humans comes from. The point was, they're all humans.

Did I say they weren't related? I said the anatomically modern humans (leaving Africa) were related to the people who had left Africa even earlier. My question was about when we acquired our shared DNA, eg with Neandertals. Maybe some of it came from our erectus ancestors before various groups left Africa. So when researchers say we have a bit of Neandertal in us, does that mean we picked it up recently or was some of it shared by virtue of our erectus ancestry.

Neanderthal genes come from Neanderthals, I should think. You can't acquire Neanderthal genes from homo erectus. (The other way around might be possible, but that wasn't the issue.)

 

[Berzerker]

We have a scientific understanding of how the universe works and the natural history of Earth. So while we don't have a complete scientific understanding of how life began, we can assess theories based on those metrics. Theories like God creating life which posit extraphysical forces (violating physical law) run counter to established scientific theory without sufficient compensatory explanatory power.

The debate was about how life began...and we just dont know.

So your source for claiming the location of Eden is 1 person.

a bunch of people think Eden might be under the Gulf. I was responding to someone else who wanted a link, so I gave her a link.

I didn't 'complain', I clarified. And I'm aware where the term anatomically modern humans comes from. The point was, they're all humans.

Clarified what? Looked to me like you never heard of anatomically modern humans and objected to my 'failure' to call them homo sapien sapiens. Did someone dispute your point?

Neanderthal genes come from Neanderthals, I should think. You can't acquire Neanderthal genes from homo erectus. (The other way around might be possible, but that wasn't the issue.)

Where did Neandertals get their DNA? Where did we get ours? The same place. It appears Neandertals split from erectus earlier than we did, but both Neandertals and us should have similar erectus DNA. That doesn't mean we didn't acquire Neandertal DNA more recently, but it could mean erectus is the source for some of our shared DNA.

 

[Perfection]

The debate was about how life began...and we just dont know.

I thought we were discussing the existence of God because that's the thread title

I'll readily agree that we don't have a step-by-step description of life's origin. I just don't think that's any reason to suppose that there must be a God.

 

[Berzerker]

I thought we were discussing the existence of God because that's the thread title

The quote you used was from a debate I was having with akka(?) about our understanding of life's origin

I'll readily agree that we don't have a step-by-step description of life's origin. I just don't think that's any reason to suppose that there must be a God.

Then we cant say we have a perfect understanding of how life began

as for God, either life begets life or the inanimate became animate because the rule book was designed to create life. I'm inclined to believe one of those, I'm less inclined to believe its all just a coincidence. But who knows... I sure dont.

 

[Berzerker]

Maybe God is Aquaman

https://phys.org/news/2017-04-oceans-galore-habitable-planets-lack.html

Makes sense... Earth may be very unusual in that we have landmasses because of plate tectonics and a relatively thin crust. Of course that situation may have arisen because our crust was sheared off during the late heavy bombardment and replaced with a bunch of "hot" material.

 

[timtofly]

I thought we were discussing the existence of God because that's the thread title

I'll readily agree that we don't have a step-by-step description of life's origin. I just don't think that's any reason to suppose that there must be a God.

More than likely because the existence of God is no more a theory, than the claim Genesis is a science textbook. The ancients never indicated they theorized God, but all indications seem to point that God was a reality. How that reality did anything was anyone's guess, as it did not seem to directly deal with all individuals. We get a lot of perceptions, but unless one can prove that any one, before accepted science, was actually carrying out scientific observations, those using science as their voice of authority, are only using their own perceptions just like any other human on earth. Humans hold both material (objective) proof, and invarifiable (subjective) proof. But whatever humans decide to let go of as insignificant proof, they only have left what they decided to retain.

 

[Valka D'Ur]

I mentioned Noah planting a vineyard and getting drunk. You want to argue about animals instead as if I mentioned animals, I didn't. You have a habit of ignoring what I say and replacing it with your own arguments which you proceed to ridicule.

If you're going to cite Genesis as one of your sources, you don't get to cherry-pick which parts of it to support your notions. The story of Noah not only mentions animals, it emphasizes animals. And I'm not ridiculing my arguments. I'm ridiculing yours.

The 1st link gave a nice overview of the region from 75kya to 8kya when the Gulf formed and people rebuilt around it, but how are you defining modern? And "maybe" is all I need, I said its possible and you wanted a link - you got it.

"Maybe" isn't fact. You keep using it as though it does mean fact.

He's an archaeologist who has argued the Persian Gulf covered Eden. You got your links and you dismissed them.

The article is 30 years old, and contains an afterword that renders the article suspect in my view.

How about something more recent?

Depends on whats causing the climate change... But I wouldn't think eg the Bering land bridge disappeared over night, or even over a year or two. On the other hand, if the flood was accompanied by large tsunamis from an ocean impact coastal peoples wouldn't have had much if any warning. If a quake can kill a 1/4 million people in the blink of a geologic eye, imagine what a large chunk of rock (or several) falling into the ocean would do.

So where did the large chunks of rock come from?

Do you want me to ask him your questions too? You dont need me to track him down.

Show me where I said I had questions to ask.

Tia Carrere should've been Lara Croft

*shrug* Her character in Relic Hunter was basically a female Indiana Jones, and like Schliemann, she simply picked up artifacts, stuck them in her pocket, and strolled on her way.

More than likely because the existence of God is no more a theory, than the claim Genesis is a science textbook. The ancients never indicated they theorized God, but all indications seem to point that God was a reality. How that reality did anything was anyone's guess, as it did not seem to directly deal with all individuals. We get a lot of perceptions, but unless one can prove that any one, before accepted science, was actually carrying out scientific observations, those using science as their voice of authority, are only using their own perceptions just like any other human on earth. Humans hold both material (objective) proof, and invarifiable (subjective) proof. But whatever humans decide to let go of as insignificant proof, they only have left what they decided to retain.

We appear to be in agreement that the existence of God is not a theory (it's a notion, at best, certainly not deserving of the term "theory" and we have enough evidence to render the term "hypothesis" irrelevant). As for Genesis not being a science textbook, I agree that it isn't, but an awful lot of people speak as though it is. Just look at your own efforts to convince me (unsuccessfully) that the story of the Flood really happened.

 

[timtofly]

We appear to be in agreement that the existence of God is not a theory (it's a notion, at best, certainly not deserving of the term "theory" and we have enough evidence to render the term "hypothesis" irrelevant). As for Genesis not being a science textbook, I agree that it isn't, but an awful lot of people speak as though it is. Just look at your own efforts to convince me (unsuccessfully) that the story of the Flood really happened.

What are you talking about; "my efforts"? I could just as easily claim God did it, that is tried to convince you unsuccessfully. I was just trying to figure out why things did not make logical sense to you. I think we know each other's positions fairly well, unless you were trying to convince me of something, why would you think it is a two way street? I doubt I am your typical idealogue that you banter back and forth with on the internet. Cause I am not the one claiming stuff. I just make comments on it. But who knows, perhaps, I don't even know what I put into these post. I just use it as a way to sort out all the thoughts in my head, and normally people do not even take the time or effort to respond.

But then again, is that not the process of placing ones thoughts out there and see how others react to them, to get some sort of self worth back in the process?