Another Big Big Thread of Religious Discussion

[Funka Genocide]

All this talk of abiogenesis is quite fascinating, though I must admit a little over my head. It seems that science has been unable to reconstruct a singular event, then? We're trying to find the perfect conditions to create life from non living matter, I take it.

For some reason, that doesn't strike me as terribly difficult to do. Not in the entirety of human existence at least. We'll do it sooner or later, the problem is that we're going about it baskasswards. Trying to recreate some prehistoric event, using limited tools. Fuck that, use everything we've got, cheat, play God, build an organism from scratch, put every god damned molecule together piece by piece, then when you've got your completely synthetic cell, make a fuckload of them and build an animal.


And when you've got this perfected, synthetic organism birthed from the mind of mankind alone, take a picture and film it. Show it on the news and drive the final stake through religion's cold black fucking heart. Because the sooner people pull their heads from the Jesus hole the sooner we can start looking forward to the fucking future.

[I_Like_Swordchucks]

Originally Posted by Funka Genocide

Fuck that, use everything we've got, cheat, play God, build an organism from scratch, put every god damned molecule together piece by piece, then when you've got your completely synthetic cell, make a fuckload of them and build an animal.

Ya know... I was totally intending to keep my mouth shut for a few posts... but I can't resist...

Even if we COULD do that, wouldn't that be, you know, intelligent design?

[Funka Genocide]

Originally Posted by I_Like_Swordchucks

Ya know... I was totally intending to keep my mouth shut for a few posts... but I can't resist...

Even if we COULD do that, wouldn't that be, you know, intelligent design?

heh heh, I never said anything against the possibility of intelligent design, just religion.

think about it.

[Serenity]

Originally Posted by I_Like_Swordchucks

Actually there is evidence... you know, Jesus, miracles, the Bible, creation itself... its not God's fault if you either refuse to believe it or try to explain it away. Its yours. Again, your own shortcoming.

My own shortcoming to believe contradictory records which have no third-party collaberation when they should? I guess I'll just have to cry myself to sleep at night.

Originally Posted by I_Like_Swordchucks

However you are right about one thing. My whole point is that nobody knows everything. The really funny thing is that you keep arguing with me about it, and not making yourself look good at all.

The only funny thing is your set up where I'm required to back down from the only logical conclusion because the illogical conclusion might also be true, if only by a very small probability. It's theoretically possible that I could win the lottery fifty two times in a row when I only buy one ticket each time, but we all know that the only way that could really happen is if I cheated.

Originally Posted by I_Like_Swordchucks

Do me a favor and look up where adenosine comes from, would ya?

Do me a favor and look up a bloke named "Alexander Todd", and cross reference it with "adenosine", would you? He synthesized it way back in 1949.

Originally Posted by Fifthfiend

Just as I myself, purely from the perspective of a participant in the conversation with no particular rights and priviledges pertaining thereto, urge both Serenity and 'Chucks to back away from this thread, take several long, deep breaths, and then return at a time when they can comport themselves with say, 95% less open hostility.

I assure you, I'm quite calm already. What is it about my writing style that is producing this response? I'm not using curse words, bold, or all caps, and I haven't thrown insults, which are typical signs of internet anger. Is it the sarcasm? Or just general tone? I do try to not appear angry when I'm not angry.

Well, if it's so small it can't be detected by current instruments, I would have to assume that it's not really a pot capable of properly holding and dispensing tea. So if we can't detect it, then there really isn't a teapot there.

Fine, it may not function for drinking, but it is shaped like a tea-pot and made of the same materials.

Whatever the explanation, I get the feeling that Serenity is shouting while she is typing, and maybe so are some other people.

Really?

Because I tend get the impression that someone is shouting while they're typing when they're typing in ALL CAPS or ALL CAPS WITH BOLD or ALL CAPS WITH ITALICS or ALL CAPS WITH BOLD AND ITALICS, and even then it relies on context.

heh heh, I never said anything against the possibility of intelligent design, just religion.

think about it.

UFO religion?

[I_Like_Swordchucks]

Originally Posted by Funka Genocide

heh heh, I never said anything against the possibility of intelligent design, just religion.

think about it.

Oh. In that case we have no problem. I don't mind the religion hatin'. A lot of 'religious' people suck all kinds of ass.

[TheSpacePope]

Show it on the news and drive the final stake through religions cold black fucking heart. Because the sooner people pull theirheads from the Jesus hole the sooner we can start looking forward to the fucking future.

And end the cycle of violence that is 2000 years old?

BLASPHEMY

[Fifthfiend]

Again, just quoting what I've been told. I've assumed that, since God created time (This grace was given us in Christ Jesus before the beginning of time (2 Timothy 1:9)) that he exists in a timeless eternity, maybe even a place where cause and effect doesn't exist. Which makes absolutely no sense, but again, we're talking about a God here.

It seems like if you're positing an entirely supernatural God who creates life then you still have abiogenesis, just, abiogenesis 'because god says so', which doesn't resolve any of Elminster's issues about life coming from non-life.

...and at that, still leaves the question of where something as incomprehensibly complex as an infinite, omniscient supernatural diety comes from, when you're positing the impossibility of something as -relatively- simple as inorganic molecules accreting over billions years into primitive living cells.

Originally Posted by TheSpacePope

And end the cycle of violence that is 2000 years old?

BLASPHEMY

Religion and any violence derived from it are much more than 2000 years old.

Frankly speaking in sociological terms religion is at best (worst?) a facilitative factor of violence. People fight for resources, same as any animal, we just have a relatively more complex set of rituals and demarcations for determining the inter-group divisions and intra-group status according to which said resources are apportioned.

[I_Like_Swordchucks]

Originally Posted by Serenity

My own shortcoming to believe contradictory records which have no third-party collaberation when they should? I guess I'll just have to cry myself to sleep at night.

Whatever floats your boat. You said 'absolutely no evidence at all'. I just pointed out that there is. Maybe not GOOD evidence, but even bad evidence is more than no evidence.

The only funny thing is your set up where I'm required to back down from the only logical conclusion because the illogical conclusion might also be true, if only by a very small probability. It's theoretically possible that I could win the lottery fifty two times in a row when I only buy one ticket each time, but we all know that the only way that could really happen is if I cheated.

Ah, you see how you've changed, though? You started off saying 'impossible' and now you've advanced to 'a very small probability'. In essence, you just conceded the point. I never expected you to back down from your belief. You can have it. I just wanted you to admit that "the illogical might also be true."

I'd be hesitant to throw logic around there, however, as logic requires known premises in order to draw grounded conclusions. As most of the premises are either unknown or contestable, the use of logic is limited. In reality, the only logical conclusion is that there is insufficient evidence to draw a conclusion.

At no point did I ever say God was more likely than no God. I just said both were possible given what humanity currently knows.

And now you did too. I win!

Do me a favor and look up a bloke named "Alexander Todd", and cross reference it with "adenosine", would you? He synthesized it way back in 1949.

I think you don't understand the word 'synthesis'. Your own body synthesizes things all the time. I synthesize DNA on a regular basis. Synthesis merely means creation, or putting several parts together to make a larger whole. However, I cannot synthesize DNA without the raw materials and catalysts that wouldn't exist without life. He did not make adenosine from raw elements with no organic assistance. Again, chemicals and enzymes would have been used that originate with life.

You can keep on going if you want, I'm just letting you know right now its a big circle.

[Funka Genocide]

The term intelligent design seems like a loaded gun, because it's been generally hijacked by religious interests to reintroduce wacked out theories into the minds of children, the final dying gasps of religion hopefully, or simply another one of it's insidious tendrils working to keep the beast breathing through the ages.

But in certain ways it makes sense, when you pair it downa nd remove all the hokey religious bullshit, you come up with something that makes a lot more sense to the rational mind than "Hey, one day something decided it was going to start metabolising, and since that day things have taken a personal interest in their existence in a particular physical format, ie: stuff became alive and decided it did not want to die, and because of that random event, things have taken on increasingly wacky aspects to avoid death!"

Strict darwinist evolution only makes sense froma certain angle, much like quantum physics. It doesn't so much describe a process as an outcome, while basically throwing it's hands in the air and admitting "I have no fucking clue what's really going on here!"


Perhaps the phenomenon we've termed "intelligence" is but itself an offshoot, an expression of some basic physical phenomenon inhererent to our universe. Perhaps intelligence is something that needs to be integrated with all other physical phenomena, much like gravity seems to keep fucking up the rotation with string theory.

So what I'm saying is that intelligen design isn't so far out there, but a dude with a beard rising from the dead and pushing fucking boulders out of the way sounds more like a zombie comic than the basis of existence.

[Fifthfiend]

You know looking back in the thread a bit --

Now lets imagine that there is this gut feeling or emotion that gives people a reasonable certainty on the existence of God. Simply because you don't perceive that feeling doesn't mean its not there, as it exists outside of that 10% you know. However it might not be outside of the 10% I know, making it a lot more reasonable for me to believe in God.

-- I really don't see where an explicitly irrational reaction can somehow be posited as a rational basis for belief.

I mean that just doesn't work.