On Being Atheist...

[Tio_Narratore]

This made me laugh out loud.

FWIW I'm an agnostic. Organized religion is a clusterfuck, but as an atheist, I'd have to buy in to the concept that a string of coincidences stretching back over 4 billion years, beginning with a cloud of dust and gas that would eventually become earth, resulted in...me. Can't quite accept that.

That and, at is most intricate level, particle physics (my specialty) is too perfect to be an accident.


K

Once something happens accidentally, it has happened, and we can, in retrospect, reconstruct every detail of what transpired. At that point, the results of the accident appear to be completely determined, and all that happened seems to have been perfectly designed to achieve that end. However, if something else had happened, we would have come to the same conclusion, that this different state of affairs would have been perfectly determined. The perfection of it all is an afterthought, not a design.

 

[stephen55]

What was there before the before the big bang? And before that? Just accept it, Stephen, it's turtles, all the way down.

I recall reading about "it's turtles all the way down" somewhere. It was something about the world being supported by something, with that something being supported by turtles. And when someone asked what supported the turtles, the reply was "turtles...it's turtles, all the way down..."

I have to admit that thinking about the origin of the universe is kind of like asking which direction is north, when you're standing at the North Pole.

From what (little) I understand about cosmology, asking about what preceded the big bang is like that. The less than satisfactory (to me) answer is supposed to be...nothing. All of space and time were created at the beginning, thus there was no space or time before the beginning, thus the question of what preceded the beginning is meaningless.

The universe is just one of those things that happen from time to time.

 

[Tio_Narratore]

I recall reading about "it's turtles all the way down" somewhere. It was something about the world being supported by something, with that something being supported by turtles. And when someone asked what supported the turtles, the reply was "turtles...it's turtles all the way down..."

I have to admit that thinking about the origin of the universe is kind of like asking which direction is north, when you're standing at the North Pole.

From what (little) I understand about cosmology, asking about what preceded the big bang is like that. The less than satisfactory (to me) answer is supposed to be...nothing. All of space and time were created at the beginning, thus there was no space or time before the beginning, thus the question of what preceded the beginning is meaningless. The universe is just one of those things that happen from time to time.

Precisely.

By the way, the original is "Elephants all the way down," and it comes from a joke about a Hindu Guru explaining cosmology. Thomas King turned it into an American Indian "story" in his Massey Lecture, and so, mutatis mutandis, the elephants became turtles.

 

[TxRad]

I recall reading about "it's turtles all the way down" somewhere. It was something about the world being supported by something, with that something being supported by turtles. And when someone asked what supported the turtles, the reply was "turtles...it's turtles, all the way down..."

I have to admit that thinking about the origin of the universe is kind of like asking which direction is north, when you're standing at the North Pole.

From what (little) I understand about cosmology, asking about what preceded the big bang is like that. The less than satisfactory (to me) answer is supposed to be...nothing. All of space and time were created at the beginning, thus there was no space or time before the beginning, thus the question of what preceded the beginning is meaningless.

The universe is just one of those things that happen from time to time.

From time to time is a good way to look at it if the math is correct. Big bang, expanding universe. Maximum expansion and then collapse back to the original pinpoint of nothingness. New big bang.

Of course this time frame looks like infinity to us but it is not infinite.

I work with geology. Time is measured in millions of years. In fact millions of years is a very small number like seconds in our lives. Understanding the universal time is even harder to wrap your mind around as the numbers get increasingly larger. Much larger. Billions replaces millions.

 

[Stella_Omega]

It started with a big bang? Then what was there before?

Newspaper reporter (interviewing a theoretical physicist)...
"So you're telling me that the entire universe and everything in it, space and time included, just suddenly popped into being, from absolutely nothing?"

Theoretical physicist...
"Yes."

Newspaper reporter...
"Well, can you explain that?"

Theoretical physicist...
"No."

The theoretician gave the wrong answer at the beginning. He should have said;

"That is the currently accepted theory, yes. Science is a process."

Once something happens accidentally, it has happened, and we can, in retrospect, reconstruct every detail of what transpired. At that point, the results of the accident appear to be completely determined, and all that happened seems to have been perfectly designed to achieve that end. However, if something else had happened, we would have come to the same conclusion, that this different state of affairs would have been perfectly determined. The perfection of it all is an afterthought, not a design.

Quoted for the mother fucking truth of it all!

Two branches of science that seem to have the most affinity with god belief are physics and medicine. it's pretty obvious to me that medical people need as much reassurance as they can get, dealing as they so ften do, with suffering and hopelessness. The pysics people are trying to make sense out of things that the macro-level human mind can't really apprehend, IMO.

The "Intelligent design" trope is common in many technician-level scientists. They work within already defined systems so that sort of makes sense.

 

[stephen55]

FWIW I'm an agnostic. Organized religion is a clusterfuck, but as an atheist, I'd have to buy in to the concept that a string of coincidences stretching back over 4 billion years, beginning with a cloud of dust and gas that would eventually become earth, resulted in...me. Can't quite accept that.

Why not? The chemistry and physics of self-replicating systems and so on and so forth....

That and, at is most intricate level, particle physics (my specialty) is too perfect to be an accident.

Particle physics is too perfect? What about mass? What about gravity? Three (forces) out of four...not bad...but hardly perfect...

 

[Pure]

agnosticism

Definition of AGNOSTIC

Quote:
1: a person who holds the view that any ultimate reality (as God) is unknown and probably unknowable; broadly : one who is not committed to believing in either the existence or the nonexistence of God or a god

2: a person who is unwilling to commit to an opinion about something <political agnostics>
From the Merriam Webster online dictionary.


amicus The 'trap' and the fallacy of agnoticism as a viable concept, is a philosophical contradiction in terms.

First, one much acknowledge intellectually that a word has a meaning; an absolute and unchanging meaning and definition, regardless of the language or the time reference frame. Words describe both concrete existents and logical/rational concepts that are universal and unchanging,

[..]Your offering of 'agnosticism' dismisses the only means by which humans can learn, the unknown and the unknowable.

One can rationally state that there is no evidence to support the existence of A, B, or C, but one can not state that a thing is unknown or unknowable; to do so is to corrupt the process by which a human can 'know', anything.

---
amicus,
you tilt the scales against agnosticism. i'm not exactly sure of your objection, but apparently it's that it's cowardly or confused or even inherently self-contradictory.

i agree there is a problem with "probably unknowable" or "unknowable" for that matter. that said, there is a perfectly good defintion of 'agnostic'

a person who says he does not know whether God exists, or more broadly that it is not known whether God exists. more technically, he says "as to the statement, 'god exists', i do not know if whether it's true or false. he might well add that the evidence appears lacking or convincing, one way or the other.

thus your last statement

but one can not state that a thing is unknown or unknowable;

is half false. the 'unknown' part. i can perfectly well say something is unknown, e.g. whether there is intelligent life on some remote planet.

i'm agnostic about it. to the one who says "there is intelligent life on some remote planet", i say, "i don't know one way or the other. i know of no convincing evidence."

that's exactly what the agnostic says to the theist. if he's wise he does not speculate as to "unknowable," though he can observe it's hitherto unknown and apparently unlikely to change [status] in the foreseable future.

as far as I can see, the posters above who are agnostic are tio and jbj (though with atheist leanings).


incidentally, i'm not an agnostic. i think there are objective truths about the universe, and it certainly exists apart from being perceived, i.e. independently of such.

my objective truths, however, differ substantially from those of both Rand and yourself (i'd say there is 80% overlap of AR and you, in any case). to be blunt, some of these you simply pull out of your ass (as does she, an interesting thinker, so don't be offended).

 

[stephen55]

The universe is just one of those things that happen from time to time.

I ripped that off from a physicist by the name of Edward P. Tyron.

He wrote a paper titled Is the Universe a Vacuum Fluctuation? which was published in the journal, Nature. (Nature 246, 396 - 397 (14 December 1973)). In that paper he writes, "I offer the modest proposal that our Universe is simply one of those things which happen from time to time."

He proposed a big bang model in which our Universe is a fluctuation of the vacuum, in the sense of the vacuum of quantum field theory. Again, from what (little) I understand, there is no such thing as empty space. At the sub-atomic level, pairs of particles, virtual particles (a particle and it's anti-particle) are constantly "popping" into and then out of existence.

At the quantum level, things are always happening, always changing. This is referred to (someone help me here) as quantum fluctuations.

Tyron proposed (I think) that the universe might simply be the result of one of those quantum fluctuations.

 

[TxRad]

Definition of AGNOSTIC

Quote:
1: a person who holds the view that any ultimate reality (as God) is unknown and probably unknowable; broadly : one who is not committed to believing in either the existence or the nonexistence of God or a god

2: a person who is unwilling to commit to an opinion about something <political agnostics>
From the Merriam Webster online dictionary.


amicus The 'trap' and the fallacy of agnoticism as a viable concept, is a philosophical contradiction in terms.

First, one much acknowledge intellectually that a word has a meaning; an absolute and unchanging meaning and definition, regardless of the language or the time reference frame. Words describe both concrete existents and logical/rational concepts that are universal and unchanging,

[..]Your offering of 'agnosticism' dismisses the only means by which humans can learn, the unknown and the unknowable.

One can rationally state that there is no evidence to support the existence of A, B, or C, but one can not state that a thing is unknown or unknowable; to do so is to corrupt the process by which a human can 'know', anything.

---
amicus,
you tilt the scales against agnosticism. i'm not exactly sure of your objection, but apparently it's that it's cowardly or confused or even inherently self-contradictory.

i agree there is a problem with "probably unknowable" or "unknowable" for that matter. that said, there is a perfectly good defintion of 'agnostic'

a person who says he does not know whether God exists, or more broadly that it is not known whether God exists. more technically, he says "as to the statement, 'god exists', i do not know if whether it's true or false. he might well add that the evidence appears lacking or convincing, one way or the other.

thus your last statement

but one can not state that a thing is unknown or unknowable;

is half false. the 'unknown' part. i can perfectly well say something is unknown, e.g. whether there is intelligent life on some remote planet.

i'm agnostic about it. to the one who says "there is intelligent life on some remote planet", i say, "i don't know one way or the other. i know of no convincing evidence."

that's exactly what the agnostic says to the theist. if he's wise he does not speculate as to "unknowable," though he can observe it's hitherto unknown and apparently unlikely to change [status] in the foreseable future.

as far as I can see, the posters above who are agnostic are tio and jbj (though with atheist leanings).


incidentally, i'm not an agnostic. i think there are objective truths about the universe, and it certainly exists apart from being perceived, i.e. independently of such.

my objective truths, however, differ substantially from those of both Rand and yourself (i'd say there is 80% overlap of AR and you, in any case). to be blunt, some of these you simply pull out of your ass (as does she, an interesting thinker, so don't be offended).

Instead of unknown and unknowable, maybe it should be unknown and unprovable.

 

[TxRad]

The universe is just one of those things that happen from time to time.

I ripped that off from a physicist by the name of Edward P. Tyron.

He wrote a paper titled Is the Universe a Vacuum Fluctuation? which was published in the journal, Nature. (Nature 246, 396 - 397 (14 December 1973)). In that paper he writes, "I offer the modest proposal that our Universe is simply one of those things which happen from time to time."

He proposed a big bang model in which our Universe is a fluctuation of the vacuum, in the sense of the vacuum of quantum field theory. Again, from what (little) I understand, there is no such thing as empty space. At the sub-atomic level, pairs of particles, virtual particles (a particle and it's anti-particle) are constantly "popping" into and then out of existence.

At the quantum level, things are always happening, always changing. This is referred to (someone help me here) as quantum fluctuations.

Tyron proposed (I think) that the universe might simply be the result of one of those quantum fluctuations.

Never mind, I answered my own question.

 

[JAMESBJOHNSON]

You gotta wonder why a perfesser with a wild-ass guess is more creditable than a raghead of 2000 years ago.

 

[estragon]

Folks, Omar Khayyam got it right.

Myself when young did eagerly frequent
Doctor and Saint and heard great argument
About it and about
But evermore
Came out by the same door
As in I went.

No one is changing anyone's mind. It's always turtles (or elephants or whatever) all the way down. And where did the primeval vacuum come from? It's vacuua all the way down.

 

[Carnevil9]

I read this many years ago, and it makes sense to me.
"Let us sacrifice to the gods. If they exist, they may be pleased, and grant us favors; if they do not exist, then no harm is done."

Also known as "Pascal's Wager."

 

[Tio_Narratore]

Folks, Omar Khayyam got it right.

Myself when young did eagerly frequent
Doctor and Saint and heard great argument
About it and about
But evermore
Came out by the same door
As in I went.

No one is changing anyone's mind. It's always turtles (or elephants or whatever) all the way down. And where did the primeval vacuum come from? It's vacuua all the way down.

Yes, but are they Hoovers or those new-fangled Dysons? Either way, I guess the universe just sucks. And whether that's good or bad just may depend on your own sexual proclivities...

 

[estragon]

And Fraser's corollary. When about to go into battle in Burma in World War II, Fraser showed up at a Scots Presbyterian Chuirch service. He said "when you're about to be shot at, it's no time to be making enemies."

 

[estragon]

Tio, and if it didn't suck, it would blow. Now back to erotica.

 

[Tio_Narratore]

I read this many years ago, and it makes sense to me.
"Let us sacrifice to the gods. If they exist, they may be pleased, and grant us favors; if they do not exist, then no harm is done."

No harm is done? Tell that to the sacrificial victims. Sorry, that's a bad bet.

If you must, why not bet that any supreme being would be far above the concern with human frailties exhibited by the hairy thunderer of the Old Testament, and presume that the deity would forgive your petty little sins?

You are free to imagine what you will...

 

[Stella_Omega]

You gotta wonder why a perfesser with a wild-ass guess is more creditable than a raghead of 2000 years ago.

Because science is a process, and he's further along in the process than the guy was 2000 years ago. His wild-ass guess is based on more and better information.

 

[JAMESBJOHNSON]

Because science is a process, and he's further along in the process than the guy was 2000 years ago. His wild-ass guess is based on more and better information.

Edward de Bono reminds us that science is political. Referring to evolution he suggests that maybe evolution happens because of viral infections that alter genes. Its plausible but contends with Darwin's theory.

Recall that 30 years ago you were sick and a sinner....acording to science.

 

[TxRad]

Edward de Bono reminds us that science is political. Referring to evolution he suggests that maybe evolution happens because of viral infections that alter genes. Its plausible but contends with Darwin's theory.

Recall that 30 years ago you were sick and a sinner....acording to science.

Evolution does not have anything to do with vial infections, other than to kill population off. genes mutate in other ways.

No. Thirty years ago you were sick and dead. The sinner part was for the preacher to decide. Him and the gossips in town. I was there, so try to tell someone who doesn't know.

 

[stephen55]

Edward de Bono reminds us that science is political.

No he doesn't. He may tell us that science is political. He may even believe it himself. That doesn't mean, and never will mean, that science is political.

Scientists may be political. I'm sure there's departmental politics in every science department at every university. Science itself, however, is not political.

And as for Recall that 30 years ago you were sick and a sinner....acording (sic) to science...sounds like politics to me.

 

[JAMESBJOHNSON]

Evolution does not have anything to do with vial infections, other than to kill population off. genes mutate in other ways.

No. Thirty years ago you were sick and dead. The sinner part was for the preacher to decide. Him and the gossips in town. I was there, so try to tell someone who doesn't know.

Dear Reader,

TEX likes to get in pissing contests matching his vienna sausage mind with John Holmes Class 'Meat-Heads' like de Bono.

 

[Stella_Omega]

and jimmybob reverts to infantilism again. That's what we get for responding to him.

 

[Liar]

Disbelief in the presence of god(s)?

Or belief in the absence of god(s)?

 

[Stella_Omega]

Disbelief in the presence of god(s)?

Or belief in the absence of god(s)?

I see what you did there.