"Belief in a higher power is a mental deficiency."
Hi guys,
Yikes!
I would like to add my two cents in this.
About the earth being round. We do have proof. Man has been to space and has seen the earth. Before that, the Bible spoke of the "Circle of the Earth." Science has proven that the earth is round.
Gen X,
I personally take offensive in your statement to Cbomb that:
"Belief in a higher power is a mental deficiency."
I don't think it is a mental deficiency. Humans were not the product of the universe. They were created. Much like a chair is not the product of a house. A house was built, created. A house will not come up in the middle of a forest after a zillion tries or years or whatever. That's silly.
A house was constructed by someone and all of the furnishings were constructed by someone too.
The universe was created by a supreme, intelligent being. That being is God. You can see the wisdom and power in creation. Take the forces of the wind, storms. Also, take the water cycle. The earth replenishes itself with this cycle. Take the sun. It puts out a nuclear explosion like around 100,000 million megatons (I don't recall how often), whereas with atomic bomb only but around like 57 megatons.
Even some scientists have pointed out that by the way the universe functions, with it's laws and how everything is just so, means that a supreme, intelligent being created it. (Newton, and others) It was wonderfully designed and created, not thrown together by chance.
I can go on and on, but as to your argument that there's a mental deficiency in believing in a higher power; There is no mental deficiency
Jazzbass
[Edited by JazzBass on 04-28-2000 at 05:50 AM]
Current Scientific Beliefs
There is too much here to reply to...
So what I thought I would do is paraphrase for you all some currently held scientific beliefs which I have read from science journals at University.
1. How big is the Universe?
This is determined by the total sum energy of the universe. It has 3 possibilities :
+ve
The universe BENDS space such that it is a hypersphere that turns in on itself. You can travel in ANY direction and end up where you started from. If this is true then the Universe is NOT infinate and asking "what exists outside that?" is an invalid question because the term "outside" has no point of reference here. As a result of its inward bend it will reach a threshhold where its matter cannot sustain an outward motion and will collapse in on itself. (Repeated BigBang theory)
Zero
The universe is actually FLAT. Space is neither bent in or out. We don't KNOW what lies beyond it but it would be assumed that it is a void of some kind. The universe may not have been created by a big bang but by a reaction of positive and negative plasma (Plasma theory)
[i]-ve[/]i
The universe BENDS space outward, like a hyperbola. As a result of this it is continuously expanding (internally that is, increasing the distance between everything NOT expanding into a void) and eventually everything will be so far apart eventually the universe will die a slow death (Entropy theory)
2. Can we travel faster than light?
Scientists have actually found particles that travel faster than the speed of light. As the theory of light travel is based on the MASS of an item (thus making it infinately massive at the speed of light), these particles which have ABSOLUTELY NO MASS travel beyond the speed of light with ABSOLUTELY NO TIME DISTORTION.
3. Possibility of Time Travel
It is true that time dilates for entities with mass travelling closer to the speed of light. This effect however is RELATIVE and only directed FORWARDS. The example was given of a 20 year period where one person is travelling at light speed. One ages 20 years while the other ages only 3 years. Nobody has time travelled!! Nobody has gone BACKWARDS in time... they have simply changed the flow of time (it is STILL forward) for them
4. Silicon Based Life
Recent scientific evaluation has suggested that Silicon based life would be impossible.
Why? As carbon based life forms our main substance for survival is WATER (H20). This interaction with our glucose chain produces Carbon Dioxide and Water. In a silicon based form of life the process would create Silicon Dioxide and COULD NOT produce Water as a constituant.
This it would have to use another liquid instead... BUT. Water is such a VERY special substance in our universe.
1. Water is the ONLY liquid whose SOLID form is lighter than its liquid form (Ice floats).
It is because of this that it is possible for life to exist. In cold areas (which MOST of the universe is) ice forms on the surface and FLOATS. This provides a unique environment where no further freezing will occur (like at our polar cap where the water below the ice sheets are FAR below zero but do not freeze).
If it was ANY other liquid element it would freeze and sink to the bottom, thus allowing the top layer to freeze again and the cycle would repeat until the entire planet is completely frozen. And we all know life cannot form if it cannot even MOVE!!!
Now here are some of my own opinions based on some things people have said :
a. God is the simplest answer (kedaman)
You are telling me that the simplest answer to our existance in the universe is that a sentient extra-universal entity made the decision to create an entire universe and "PROGRAM" every single physical law, chemical reaction, sub-atomic interaction, intellectual thought, pre-destined eventuality and sentient inhabitant????
That is NOT simple at all!!!
The most SIMPLEST answer is that WE JUST ARE.
b. Us being 1 in a Zillion is just silly
When you ARE 1 in a Zillion of COURSE you think its silly... because as far as we are concerned we are a 100 in a 100 chance of being here and NOT 1 in 1,000,000,000,000,000 chance of being here. Our tiny and feable human minds cannot COMPREHEND this and so because we think we are a 100% chance of existing we postulate that SOMETHING must have created us.
We become egotistical because we think we were MEANT to be here and that we have a PURPOSE in being here.
It took the wright brothers SEVERAL tries before flying... does that mean we were not MEANT to fly because it didn't happen the first time? How do you know that the Human race hasn't started up several HUNDRED times before and only NOW have we been successful?
c. Proof by Contradiction (Sam)
This is a MATHEMATICAL proof only. It has no place in the real world or in science. You have to stop applying mathematical principles to our world... WE designed mathematics... WE came up with the rules... and we refined them to our own specifications.
Is there anywhere in the universe where there is the magical number i Which is the Square Root of -1?
Of course not. We made it up, and then applied our OWN rules of validation to prove it. Science doesn't work like that.
Proof by Elimination. Oh please!!! We don't know ALL the possibilities so eliminating a couple hundred doesn't mean the 101st one is correct!!!
d. Religous people have a mental deficiency.
I think ALL life is an abnormality. It certainly isn't the most common thing in our universe, in fact to our knowledge to date it is the ONLY time it has existed in our universe.
That makes us "in opposition to what is normal"... otherwise known as ABNORMAL.
We are NOT natural... that has been proved by the fact that we no longer abide by the laws of nature. We don't die when we were meant to, we change our own genetics, we live in environments that are not hospitable. Everything nature defines for everything else we ignore.
So when I say religious beliefs is a deficiency I am not being cruel or insulting (yeah I know it doesn't look that way). What I am trying to say is that when a sentient being has to credit its existance, purpose and direction to a "Higher and intangable, unprovable and PERFECT Creator of the Universe" it does suggest due to the extremely unlikely focus that the person would be considered mentally deficient
If you went to a psychologist and described ALL of the things you believe in... but said it was a Rabbit you were talking about and NOT God they would lock you up and throw away the key. It is only because our politically correct world says "NEVER doubt religion" that we allow beliefs in such far fetched things to continue
e. God exists outside of time/space etc, etc
Kedaman, you wanted me to disprove your theory.
1. Man was created in God's image (The Bible)
2. God's image is therefor bipedal, air breathing etc
3. If God exists OUTSIDE time/space then
a. Why were we created in his image?
b. Why is his image that of a planet walking, air breathing biped?
f. Time Travel ala Sam
There is a flaw in your theory. For particles to collide they have to be in 3-dimensional space. If they were only in 1-dimensional space they would never even intersect.
Time is ONE-DIMENSIONAL!!!
Therefor no particles from "parallel" timelines would ever collide with others.
PLUS. Time has only ONE direction. It is a VECTOR just like our first-dimension (funny how the 1st and 4th are the same in properties with one being physical and the other temporal).
It is the 4th-dimension that allows US in the 3rd-dimension to actually exist. Thus to answer Cbomb, you CANNOT exist within the 4th-dimension just like you CANNOT exist in the 1st-dimension.
g. Idea that every possibility could coexist as a parralell universe as you're suggesting is in fact impossible
Sam! Are you saying "impossible" ;)
If the area it is contained in is infinate, then an infinate number of infinates COULD exist in infinity. Heck!!! The whole definition of infinity is that it is the biggest thing there is.
You CAN'T use mathematics again here. If you WANT to I could use it against you ;)
0 + 0 + (0 x infinate) = 0
Therefor I have PROVED that an infinate number of possibilities CAN exist in the same place next to each other