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Location: "Silicon Valley" (part of San Francisco Bay Area, California, USA)
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Quote:
Originally Posted by nj185
I don't think God cares; god might.
You are still not using it correctly. In both instances, the correct spelling is "God". See the dictionaries I quoted above, both of which are considered very authoritative.
Location: "Silicon Valley" (part of San Francisco Bay Area, California, USA)
4,375 posts, read 4,070,027 times
Reputation: 2158
Quote:
Originally Posted by Wise TibetanMonkey
Dogmatic humanity makes god look dogmatic so they are all silly.
That makes no sense. How could a dogmatic human religion have any bearing on the nature of God or whether God is silly?
That's like saying Newton made the force of gravity look silly.
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Cosmos implies that God is not necessary to create the universe,
Not really. Neither this version nor the previous version made any comment on the necessity or existence of God, nor should they, because science does not and cannot have any comment on that.
By definition, if you say "I know with 100% certainty that there is a God", or "I know with 100% certainty that there is not a God", or "I know with 100% certainty that religion X is not correct", then you have left the realm of science and are now dealing with philosophy or religion. In other words, none of those are scientific statements.
Science is concerned strictly with the universe, what can be observed. By definition, God cannot be observed and is not a unitary object, field, or energy which can be detected with scientific instruments.
Is God necessary for there to be a universe? Certainly not. Does it follow from this that there is no God? Certainly not. I don't have to exist in order for this words to be composed and transmitted to you. These words could have been generated by a computer. However, the fact that my existence is not necessary for what you observe to have happened does not indicate that I do not exist.
Quote:
and that he did, his creation looks rather chaotic and bizarre.
I strongly disagree. I look out at the vastness of space and I see great beauty and great order. The universe is governed by scientific laws.
Now, this is obviously a matter of opinion, and there is not and cannot be any scientific evidence for this opinion, but looking at the universe as a human, my human heart and my human soul detects God. By God I mean that which wrote the laws of physics with a Purpose. No scientific instrument can ever detect that, only the human mind.
An atheist would look at the same universe, and feel similar awe, but arrive at a different conclusion, that the universe is mechanical and materialistic, and there is no Purpose. There's no problem with that.
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The Church believed that god
No, in this context it is "God". This spelling would be correct if you had written "The Church believed that a god", but you didn't include an article, so the correct spelling is "God".
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would have created a universe that made sense,
And it does. Every year scientists discover more about it that makes more sense. They also discover more mysteries, but this hardly constitutes a universe that doesn't make sense. It just means our knowledge of it is incomplete.
However, I'm not clear on where the Catholic Church predicted that the universe would "make sense"? Perhaps you can indicate for me where this is found in the Catholic Catechism? My father is Catholic, but I wasn't baptized nor raised in the Church, so perhaps you could show us. Having read Brother Astronomer, written by a Jesuit Brother who has a PhD in Planetary Science, I did not see any reference to this supposed prediction. In fact, he said "God could have created the universe any way He wanted."
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Are there any laws that god followed, morally or esthetically to make sense?
This sentence does not compute grammatically, perhaps you could edit it so I can understand what you are asking, and if you can, I will formulate a response. Are you asking us what laws God wrote that made sense? One I can think of is the relationship between magnetism and electricity (Maxwell's Equations). If there is a God, then God wrote those laws, and they make sense, to me, though I don't have a college degree yet, and my understanding of them is that of a layman. Do these laws make sense to you?
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Are the stars there to create awe or confusion among us?
I think the stars are there for the same Purpose as the whole universe/multiverse; that being, in my opinion, for sentient beings to evolve in multiple places, to share existence with God and learn of His Glory and His love for us.
Of course, I am a Deist, and my "natural religion" is only one interpretation of God among many. Others include the major monotheistic religions, the ancient Greek and Roman theology, Buddhism, Hinduism, etc. All are true and valid.
Atheism is another valid interpretation of God.
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I really don't see the need for god.
Again, you mean "need for God". And, I don't see the need for you, yet you still exist, or seem to. The absence of a need for something to exist doesn't necessarily indicate that it does not exist. What's your point?
That's a really narrow definition of "God", one that is basically limited to very narrow sects of the ethical monotheistic religions. On Science Friday today they ran a repeat of an interview with Carl Sagan, I think he put it very well:
I think the new Cosmos series is doing a good job of staying with that approach.
Those definitions are rather vague and confusing. A cat is an animal that says "meow." Very simple.
You would not confuse a cat with any other animal, except perhaps a parrot.
That's the thing. A guy would not understand what half of the world population is going through. No wonder he let Eve take a bite without much thought.
He seems a rather chauvinist male. A goddess would make more sense. We guys don't need a god that much.
Again, you mean "need for God". And, I don't see the need for you, yet you still exist, or seem to. The absence of a need for something to exist doesn't necessarily indicate that it does not exist. What's your point?
My point is that an universe without god makes more sense than an universe with a god.
What sense does it make to you that god pitched an asteroid at the dinosaurs, destroying his own creation? Was he making room for us?
The cosmos is full of STUFF and some of it will eventually destroy earth but not for sometime as
Jesus hasn't set up for His 1000 year reign on earth yet ,but down the road earth is destroyed by fire .We may be subject to other comos related even whether meteors ,comets, or asteroids not
withstanding solar flares that wipe out our grid . What I do believe is the visions by the apostles
that sees the stars falling are not stars at all but asteroids and in one case Wormwood star its believed by astronomers to be a rogue planet that will sweep past earth leaving behind red oxide and nitric oxcide making the water bitter, the oceans red like blood and killing most of the fish in
the seas (non specific). Men will die from the toxic water. The heavens are full of interesting images. We HD the hubble tele pics of Orion and found at least 10 biblical images just in Orion!!
Location: "Silicon Valley" (part of San Francisco Bay Area, California, USA)
4,375 posts, read 4,070,027 times
Reputation: 2158
Quote:
Originally Posted by Wise TibetanMonkey
Those definitions are rather vague and confusing.
Welcome to the world of philosophy, my friend.
Quote:
A cat is an animal that says "meow." Very simple.
Yes, but we know for a fact that animals exist, and we know their properties and their behavior. God is something the human mind detects, depending on how that human interprets what they feel. God is not an object or field in the universe that we can measure with a scientific instrument. So if you're looking for a definition along those lines, it seems there is not one to be found.
Location: "Silicon Valley" (part of San Francisco Bay Area, California, USA)
4,375 posts, read 4,070,027 times
Reputation: 2158
Quote:
Originally Posted by Wise TibetanMonkey
My point is that an universe without god makes more sense than an universe with a god.
Again, you mean "a universe without God", not "an universe without god".
You could have said "a universe without a god", then you wouldn't have had to capitalize the G.
In any case, this isn't really a point, because to someone who does believe in God, it makes perfect sense.
Quote:
What sense does it make to you that god pitched an asteroid at the dinosaurs, destroying his own creation?
Well, I'm a Deist, we generally do not believe in Divine Intervention beyond causing the universe and/or multiverse to exist, so in my opinion, this was a natural phenomenon not caused by God.
I think the Catholic Church tends to agree, for a monotheistic interpretation:
Quote:
Originally Posted by Brother Guy Consolmagno, SJ, Ph.D. (Planetary Science)
The idea is this: If you're making God the direct cause of everything — trees grow because God made them grow; lightning strikes because God made it strike — you're turning God into Jupiter or any other god of the pagan pantheon, where people said things occurred because the gods caused them to happen. One breakthrough in Christian theology, going back to Thomas Aquinas and Augustine, was recognizing the difference between primary and secondary cause. This theological point is really important to science. The simplest explanation is that God made the laws of physics and has chosen to follow them. So nature has a certain amount of freedom within it; humans certainly have free will. We're not puppets, controlled every moment by this omnipotent puppet God.
Yes, but we know for a fact that animals exist, and we know their properties and their behavior. God is something the human mind detects, depending on how that human interprets what they feel. God is not an object or field in the universe that we can measure with a scientific instrument. So if you're looking for a definition along those lines, it seems there is not one to be found.
How about if I advance a definition that consists of a single word and that you and I agree on?
"GOD IS A MYSTERY"
He could have done things differently, and still be god. He could show himself to us, and still be god.
Does he want to be a mystery?
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