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Many people, in fact a majority of people, seem to have a need to believe that their existence has some special meaning. The notion of a creator Being who created the universe and is therefore in control of events. This concept of a creator Being, who created them and all humans for a particular purpose, is very comforting to many people.
Life has no special meaning to you? Why do you fight to survive if it has no special meaning to you?
Try hypotheses God, that may or may not exist, Cause and Effect God created the heaven and the earth is all that he claimed. And it still exists, but not as created, full of pollution and self destruction. Man fell, lies, deception, and confusion; to murder and make war for self gain is the path he chose: self destruction: the gods of his own making that created nothing and destroys the whole earth in the end.
God is every bit as real as any Government. "Governments," do not actually exist either, it is just men doing as they desire. No government will ever come and arrest or do anything to you, it will always be men doing it in the name of some government or god. Always men lying and killing in the name of some government or some god of their own making, or their own lack of understanding.
By the words and doings of the God Story, I know his concepts are righteous.
And by the words and doings of Governments/men, I know their ways, they are liars and deceivers.
God is the God of truth.
Governments are the Governments of liars and deceivers.
Science can be bought, lies can be established as truth.
Science: Dark Matter comes from Nothing.
Truth: Dark matter comes from the Unknown.
What is the "Truth?"
Governments try to make you believe whatever they say is the Truth; God requires you to search the matter out for yourself if you desire to know Truth. And one of these methods is a "Dumbdown" of nations of parrots repeating whatsoever they are told.
I don't think there ever existed a cat named Jesus who was supposedly a son of a certain god.
It's the most silly story that was created some odd years after he supposedly existed. Would you believe a an old magical tale with little to no evidence in modern times? I doubt you would.
You can think whatever you desire, and so can we all. And please do...and don't let anyone else make up your own mind for you.
And I believe it is just as likely that meow did exist, did go into the temple that did exist, overturned the tables of "Business as usual," taken before Festus, and condemned...but the magic...sometimes Jesus walking thru a door might just mean "He just walked thru the door." Ask my mamma; I was gone, but then I walked thru the door. Where did I go then? Oh, he just flew outta here.
I have no reason to believe Jesus did not exist, even though his name wasn't even Jesus, and a son of God means he was taught by the word and works of God as written; and not the word and works of a vain imagination. What blessing or curse is dependent upon you believing something unbelievable? None. I doubt they were talking to Christ and he just up and flew away and disappeared into the clouds other than it was a foggy cloudy day...and I could do that. It is a mystery.
If you want to walk with God, don't be greedy, don't lie, don't steal, don't murder...a way of Blessings.
If you don't want to walk God, greed is good, lying is fun, to steal is wonderful, to murder is acceptable...a way of Curses.
And as far as I'm concerned, God created man and God exists with man as Subconsciousness; as a universal Subconscious self; And Man exists with God as Consciousness; a Consciousness Self; as One together. And according to Science, one of those, "Indeed," exists and operates beneath and beyond our Consciousness controlling everything that allows us to think, decide, and act as we please, to our own benefit or harm; that we may learn how to exist peacefully with one and another...or not...you choice, your decision, not based upon what you think, or know; but rather the deeds you do and the blood upon your hands.
And Consciousness is the shallow end of existence.
And the Subconsciousness is deep, and connected to the deep, the unknown of the Universe.
Life has no special meaning to you? Why do you fight to survive if it has no special meaning to you?
Try hypotheses God, that may or may not exist, Cause and Effect God created the heaven and the earth is all that he claimed. And it still exists, but not as created, full of pollution and self destruction. Man fell, lies, deception, and confusion; to murder and make war for self gain is the path he chose: self destruction: the gods of his own making that created nothing and destroys the whole earth in the end.
God is every bit as real as any Government. "Governments," do not actually exist either, it is just men doing as they desire. No government will ever come and arrest or do anything to you, it will always be men doing it in the name of some government or god. Always men lying and killing in the name of some government or some god of their own making, or their own lack of understanding.
By the words and doings of the God Story, I know his concepts are righteous.
And by the words and doings of Governments/men, I know their ways, they are liars and deceivers.
God is the God of truth.
Governments are the Governments of liars and deceivers.
Science can be bought, lies can be established as truth.
Science: Dark Matter comes from Nothing.
Truth: Dark matter comes from the Unknown.
What is the "Truth?"
Governments try to make you believe whatever they say is the Truth; God requires you to search the matter out for yourself if you desire to know Truth. And one of these methods is a "Dumbdown" of nations of parrots repeating whatsoever they are told.
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I also said "I see no reason to suppose that the universe itself is a type of intelligence. In fact the universe seems to be exactly as indifferent to human existence as a rock is indifferent to human existence."
Do you understand that you are made up of the same "stuff" as is a rock? And a rock is made up of the same "stuff" that makes up the matter which makes up the universe. We call this stuff "atoms," and atoms are interchangable. Atoms of matter make up rocks and humans and planets, stars and entire galaxies. Humans do have a special trait that rocks and planets and suns do not seem to share, however. And that is sentient consciousness. Humans are very literally the stuff of the universe attempting to contemplate itself. That is about as "special" as I might hope for. Make believe serves no purpose as far as I can see.
Life has no special meaning to you? Why do you fight to survive if it has no special meaning to you?
Try hypotheses God, that may or may not exist, Cause and Effect God created the heaven and the earth is all that he claimed. And it still exists, but not as created, full of pollution and self destruction. Man fell, lies, deception, and confusion; to murder and make war for self gain is the path he chose: self destruction: the gods of his own making that created nothing and destroys the whole earth in the end.
God is every bit as real as any Government. "Governments," do not actually exist either, it is just men doing as they desire. No government will ever come and arrest or do anything to you, it will always be men doing it in the name of some government or god. Always men lying and killing in the name of some government or some god of their own making, or their own lack of understanding.
By the words and doings of the God Story, I know his concepts are righteous.
And by the words and doings of Governments/men, I know their ways, they are liars and deceivers.
God is the God of truth.
Governments are the Governments of liars and deceivers.
Science can be bought, lies can be established as truth.
Science: Dark Matter comes from Nothing.
Truth: Dark matter comes from the Unknown.
What is the "Truth?"
Governments try to make you believe whatever they say is the Truth; God requires you to search the matter out for yourself if you desire to know Truth. And one of these methods is a "Dumbdown" of nations of parrots repeating whatsoever they are told.
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Quote:
Originally Posted by auralmack
What is the "Truth?"
This is a really good question. Humans often postulate various kind of "truths," including philosophical truths and moral truths. In reality these are only opinions however. The only real truths involve the way facts coincide with events. A thing occurred, and the exact events that describe the event represent "the truth." Everything else is an opinion.
One of the most common moral and philosophical truths is that humans should not morder other humans. The reasons for, and benefits from, this sort of "truth" are obvious. And yet we as a society have concluded that the are valid reasons why killing other humans may be acceptable under certain conditions. In self defence or in times of war, for example. In America we even execute people. Executions are nothing more than a legalized form of premeditated murder. Whether such institutionalized murder is right or wrong is a matter of opinion. The execution itself is simply an event however. Details of the event represent truth only if the details record exactly what occurred. Justification for this particular event is a matter of opinion.
So... when you declare that "God exists," you are declaring your personal opinion, since no such "God" (first cause, prime mover, creator Being; whatever conforms to your personal concept of God), is actually observed. Only postulated. If I declare that E=MC², for on the other hand, I have direct proof (nuclear detonations; nuclear power plants) to justify the truth of my statement. The law of conservation of energy was formulated as a result of centuries experimentation and direct observation. Our modern technology, including that computer that you are sitting in front of and that smart phone in your pocket, are a direct result of applying our understanding of quantum mechanics to achieve practical useful results. Modern technology was not developed based on opinion.
Declarations such as "Jesus died for our sins but returned to life and subsequently flew away," on the other hand, or "Jesus is going to return and sit in judgement of humankind when the world ends," are simply opinions founded on baseless declarations and unrealistic beliefs.
Because we have thousands of years of evidence that nothing of the kind has ever occured. Declaring something to be true, or even implicitly believing a thing to be true, has no necessary effect on whether a thing is true or not.
In conclusion, opinion is often mistaken for truth. Especially popular opinion. But opinions are subject to changing overtime. The Bible considered slavery, for example, as simply a natural condition. In modern times however slavery is considered morally repugnant. Slavery has been, officially at least, outlawed worldwide. Opinions change. Because opinions are NOT truths. The exact nature of the way an event occurred (the cause of an event), THAT is an example of "the truth."
If you want to walk with God, don't be greedy, don't lie, don't steal, don't murder...a way of Blessings.
If you don't want to walk God, greed is good, lying is fun, to steal is wonderful, to murder is acceptable...a way of Curses.
I'm so thankful that I don't have to believe in this. These are your beliefs based on your reality.
Geed is never good regardless if you're walking with a god or not.
Lying is never fun regardless if you're walking with a god or not.
Stealing is never wonderful regardless if you're walking with a god or not.
To murder is not typically acceptable regardless if you're walking with a god or not.
your traits you assign to it wrong. Not that nothing is there.
all the science is clearly pointing to us being part of a larger more complex system than what we thought. If human are described as life and the system we are in is more complex (processing more information in a meaningful way) then "nothing there" is just nonsensical.
But ...
why does it have to be your omni-thing? why a biblegod god thing and not just however the universe works?
there is no reason that no bible good means being bad is acceptable. why would one even think that? infact, if a person thinks that how can I take his word on what the universe wants?
Life has no special meaning to you? Why do you fight to survive if it has no special meaning to you?
Because through Evolution, survival instincts are ingrained in nearly all complex species.
In humans, survival instincts are imprinted on the amygdala, but human evolution has resulted in the development of cortical areas in the frontal cortex that process sensory input and act as an intermediary between the frontal lobes and the amygdala.
Instead of acting instinctively, although that still happens, the human brain processes sensory input first, to determine what action, if any, should be taken.
The result of that is the Fight/Freeze/Flight Response. For lower order organisms, they are programmed to do one of those three, while higher order organisms will process sensory input to evaluate it and then determine which of the three responses to take.
When humans encounter a threat, unless the recoil response is triggered, they will evaluate the sensory data and then based on learned behavior and past experience decide whether to fight, freeze or flee.
That works well, unless trauma is involved. In that case, the frontal cortex shuts down, and while it still processes sensory data, it doesn't evaluate it, it just shunts it to the amygdala.
I know, because I'm alive and 8 people are not alive. I didn't kill all 8 of them, because apparently one panicked and shot one of their own people dead, or so I'm told, but while that was happening, I damn sure wasn't thinking about how special I was in this Universe.
If I could remember exactly what happened, the only thing I would have been thinking is I did not intend to die that day, and I damn sure didn't want to die in Panama (a country I would never care to visit again) and I would probably be thinking I was a better solider than those slugs.
In addition to the evolutionary survival instinct, we're taught to cherish life, not so much because humans are special, but because our associations with other people can immeasurably improve our lives (and they can also bring tremendous harm to us).
There's nothing special about humans. We're here not because of some god-thing, but purely by accident and happenstance and those accidents were mostly celestial phenomenons and cataclysms.
If Earth isn't hit by a planetoid, then humans never exist. If an asteroid/comet doesn't bring the building blocks of Life to Earth, then humans never exist. If the dinosaurs aren't wiped out, then humans never exist.
And, we're not the only living organisms in the Universe.
Do G/K-Class Stars support Life?
Um, this one does. Our own Sun is a G-Class Star.
There are 10,000 G/K-Class Stars within 50 light years of Earth.
Every single one of those has 6-12 terrestrial and gaseous planets, so that's 60,000 to 120,000 planets just within 50 light years.
The celestial mechanics for the formation of G/K-Class Stars inherently lends itself to the formation of terrestrial and gaseous planets. Are they arrayed like our Solar System: Mercury, Venus, Mars, Asteroid Belt, Jupiter, Saturn, Uranus and Neptune?
Yes. The actual distances will be different, because that's dependent on the star's mass, it's rotational speed and the orbital velocity of the solar system, but they're there.
And, just like our Solar System, some of those planets will have water in one form or another, but some won't.
If Life originated on one of those planets, it wouldn't be nearly as evolved as our planet, but if Life came to the planet, it might be, and the "pinnacle" of evolution is likely going to be humanoid.
Anyway, the supposition that humans are special or that life on Earth is special is purely an ethnocentric view.
If you want to walk with God, don't be greedy, don't lie, don't steal, don't murder...a way of Blessings.
On what basis do you make that claim?
Your god has a track record of changing his mind, altering covenants, establishing new covenants, and then failing to follow through on covenants.
Case in point, the Davidic Covenant.
Your god swore up and down on a stack of bibles that Judah would always exist, and that a descendant of David would always rule.
Shortly thereafter, Judah ceased to exist, and of the remaining living descendants of David, all but one were executed and the one that wasn't executed, King Zedekiah, was blinded and led away in chains, dying in captivity and never producing another heir.
That does not exactly exude trust and confidence in your whimsical god.
So, how do we know that whatever covenants and promises your god dreams up are still in play, or haven't been altered or will be ignored?
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