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Intelligence not agreeing with making errors is a western way of thinking. Many great thinkers from the east would say that errors lead to new understanding, and that it would be better to attempt much and fail much (and learn much), than attempt little and have the easy and perfect life, appearing superficially wise and powerful.
Someone like Abraham Lincoln could be considered an intelligent person, but made many mistakes on his way up the ladder of accomplishment and growth. The same can be said of countless other persons from around the world and over time. You gain most from the observation and effort put in, not the measure of your results. Americans love to belittle people and throw stones based on only end results, and never give a moment into seeing all the rest that has been involved. It's a narrow, shallow, and limited way of seeing. Just another example of "See little, know little".
I'm of the opinion that God has changed his approach over time. Dinosaurs? Yeah, around and carrying on, but perhaps not the ideal way to go, so taking an exit. The old vengeful and domineering God of the OT? That could only go on for so long until a totally different approach was needed (the relaxed and mutual friend in the form of Jesus). Look around the universe, and the constant you'll see is change.
Randomness, trial and error, is an essential aspect of creativity. Human artists and inventors try things, build on what their predecessors did. So maybe creativity works that way at the universal level also.
I think that most people never learn anything in school about complex systems. It's a very different way of thinking, and it is not mainstream in our society. I learned about it by chance, starting in the 1980s, and it changed my whole way of thinking. But it's very hard to explain my thinking to most people, since they have no familiarity whatsoever with a holistic systems perspective.
And its not a problem until their lack of understanding being presented as a default or enough to over ride an understanding.
I personally feel some of atheist avoid the almost empirical nature of the statement, even cover it up, due the feeling that they, as real atheist, are not going to make excuses for for believing in anything. We have atheism to be loyal to after all.
On what evidence are you concluding that the universe is an infinitely complex information system?
"infinite" might be an issue. But its clearly so much more complex that it might appear that way to us. One piece of evidence is how we have no physics for a singularity. We can give small medium and large examples.
Who says "god," or the Universe, has to be all-knowing and all-powerful? Somebody in the middle ages decided that, and we have to be stuck with it forever?
We DO NOT KNOW what God is, or why or how he/it does things.
The hardest thing for humans to know is their own limitations, what they cannot know. So wheels spin for centuries over questions like that.
Within our time perspective, what seems like eons could actually be an instant. Why get so caught up in how we experience time and space? The Universe is infinitely more than that.
Who says? Every minister and priest I ever heard.
Are we stuck with it forever? Well, apparently. And that is one of the atheist's contentions.
I haven't said it is a while, but I am sure the god of the bible is not real. Some other force...I am more open to that.
1. For religionists you can't say that god is all-knowing and he's still learning.
2. No, "how convenient" isn't a bias. The christian fervently believes in prayer, and when prayer fails (as it often/usually does), then the christian says, "Well god works in mysterious ways".
3. Yes, we are on here for different purposes. I am on here to fight religious overreach. You are on here to fight with individual posters.
By the way, how's that making a list coming along?
You don't understand what prayer is. Prayer is not like ordering at the drive-in fast food window and expecting to be handed everything you ordered. That kind of prayer obviously would not work very often. Prayer means getting into alignment with God, the higher self, or the universe, the source, whatever anyone wants to call it. When you are in alignment, you get what you are supposed to get and you want what you are supposed to want. That is prayer. Not shoving a list of wants in God's face and then being angry when your demands are not met.
Thoreau...I went to the methodist church for years and always heard that god is "all knowing". I went to catholic church for years and always heard that god is "all knowing". The catholic and methodist churches are hardly fundamentalist. If god is not "all-knowing", one of the most basic foundation stones of christianity just crumbled.
And when "we" have these conversations, one has to realize that they're not always one-on-one chats.
So a basic foundation stone of Christianity crumbled. Let it crumble, who needs it. Since when are we obliged to think along lines set up hundreds or thousands of years ago?
Correct, I am not. But when you, or Mystic, or anyone else (with or without doctoral degrees to cite) have any evidence for that conscious universe... as opposed to a universe with many conscious inhabitants... I stand ready to adjust my thinking. Until then, an interesting hypothesis, but all evidence points toward the latter. Left with the choice between "no evidence" and "all the evidence we have to date," I can tell you where common sense leads me.
Common sense leads you to your preconceived and preferred ideas. Well that happens to all of us.
Are we stuck with it forever? Well, apparently. And that is one of the atheist's contentions.
I haven't said it is a while, but I am sure the god of the bible is not real. Some other force...I am more open to that.
Every minister and priest was taught the same old nonsense that has been repeated for generations. Atheists love to argue against traditional religion because it's so easy to demolish it.
You don't understand what prayer is. Prayer is not like ordering at the drive-in fast food window and expecting to be handed everything you ordered. That kind of prayer obviously would not work very often. Prayer means getting into alignment with God, the higher self, or the universe, the source, whatever anyone wants to call it. When you are in alignment, you get what you are supposed to get and you want what you are supposed to want. That is prayer. Not shoving a list of wants in God's face and then being angry when your demands are not met.
Well, thank you for your definitive (but incorrect) version of what prayer is to all christians.
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