RogueTrader,
your prose was quite elegant and clearly divinely inspired. Thanks
your prose was quite elegant and clearly divinely inspired. Thanks
god told me to post this here
- Thread starter Gordon Gekko
- Start date
If one believes in evolution, then all human brains should have evolved at the same rate. Thus 100% would be more on target than just 95% (your 95% claim seems to imply that some human brains can be more highly evolved than others).
I don't believe in the theory of evolution as proposed by evolutionists. I am not saying it is untrue, I don't have proof one way or the other. It is not the explanation that I have adopted, at least not as defined by most.
I do find it interesting that those who embrace that theory with full faith are typically the first to condemn people who practice faith in God.
I might be able to get behind the theory that man has evolved according to the plan of God though. However, most people see contradiction behind the concept of God planning evolution and the concept of evolution moving on its own without any supreme intelligence guiding the process.
Are some humain brains more highly evolved than others?
Good question.
My opinion is that the brain does not evolve, the soul does.
I am not a religious person at all and have always hated very evangelical religious people who have tried to push religion down my throat. But at that same time, evangelical type atheists are just as annoying. Why not get a life. If being religious makes someone happy thats wonderful. There are far too many unhappy people. You see to post stuff all the time about religion because the religious crazies annoy you..but your the same..just an atheist version of it. Find something else to do with your time.
I have no choice to reject your entire reply, since it is rejecting
reason while at the same time USING reason to make your case, thus making it completely contradictory.
If I were to accept your premise that reason is not
a valid tool, then I am forced reject your argument.
Further.... your demand to prove the validity of the laws of logic
has some serious problems.
PROOF is a concept that can only have meaning within an
established logical framework. Proof is a product of logic and
they exist within the same framework.
Your very demand of proof requires that logic itself exists,
thus contradicting yourself again.
The rest of your post is full of far too many fallacies and
semantical errors to address. For example:
"I don't reject human's faculty of reason, I think it is great and should be applied to the fields where it is functional. Applying it to love, art, God, is foolish. "
A typical, unsupported empty assertion.
Sorry... god does not get a free ride any more than unicorns.
" Nearly every man who is married knows that the faculty of reason is worthless when it comes to having a long term relationship with a woman."
Oh really? Bandwagon fallacy.
and so on...and so on...
So where are we so far? You have made several extraordinary claims:
1) That reason is NOT the best system for knowing truth.
Yet you provide no alternative
2) That god exists, yet provide no proof that would satisfy
any scientist, rational person, or court of law.
Basically your whole argument reduces down to this:
You reject my framework of knowledge gathering, which
is science, logic, and reason, and in its place rely on FEELINGS or
FAITH or PERSONAL EXPERIENCE.
Thus you think you can claim that your "personal experience"
constitutes proof for your god.
One big problem here.....
Your system is NOT at all consistent. I already proved this
through my faith example.
I can FAITH that you are simply wrong.
I can have a PERSONAL EXPERIENCE which tells me that
you are WRONG.
I can FEEL that you are WRONG.
A framework which allows so many glaring contradictions
is no framework at all, but an irrational mess which provides
NO consistent way of discovering the truth.
peace
axeman
reason while at the same time USING reason to make your case, thus making it completely contradictory.
If I were to accept your premise that reason is not
a valid tool, then I am forced reject your argument.
Further.... your demand to prove the validity of the laws of logic
has some serious problems.
PROOF is a concept that can only have meaning within an
established logical framework. Proof is a product of logic and
they exist within the same framework.
Your very demand of proof requires that logic itself exists,
thus contradicting yourself again.
The rest of your post is full of far too many fallacies and
semantical errors to address. For example:
"I don't reject human's faculty of reason, I think it is great and should be applied to the fields where it is functional. Applying it to love, art, God, is foolish. "
A typical, unsupported empty assertion.
Sorry... god does not get a free ride any more than unicorns.
" Nearly every man who is married knows that the faculty of reason is worthless when it comes to having a long term relationship with a woman."
Oh really? Bandwagon fallacy.
and so on...and so on...
So where are we so far? You have made several extraordinary claims:
1) That reason is NOT the best system for knowing truth.
Yet you provide no alternative
2) That god exists, yet provide no proof that would satisfy
any scientist, rational person, or court of law.
Basically your whole argument reduces down to this:
You reject my framework of knowledge gathering, which
is science, logic, and reason, and in its place rely on FEELINGS or
FAITH or PERSONAL EXPERIENCE.
Thus you think you can claim that your "personal experience"
constitutes proof for your god.
One big problem here.....
Your system is NOT at all consistent. I already proved this
through my faith example.
I can FAITH that you are simply wrong.
I can have a PERSONAL EXPERIENCE which tells me that
you are WRONG.
I can FEEL that you are WRONG.
A framework which allows so many glaring contradictions
is no framework at all, but an irrational mess which provides
NO consistent way of discovering the truth.
peace
axeman
"How can we trust our senses? And if we can't trust our senses, how much less can we trust our science? "
Your implying that science is somehow flawed because
our senses are not perfect???
My senses cannot directly experience infrared light, or
see a microbe, yet science can, thus proving, that perfect
senses are NOT a requirement for discovering our universe.
Science is an excellent tool for verifying things in a multitude
of ways, including sensory. This accumulation of data,
including sensory, instrumental, data, etc, combined give
us a level of confidence for what we accept as fact.
Nothing in science is 100% fact. Unlike religion, it is always
OPEN to being proven wrong, or clarified.
The bigger the pile of the evidence, the stronger our
case for what we are theorizing.
Where is the pile for god? The BIGGEST extraordinary claim
any man can come up with.
peace
axeman
Your implying that science is somehow flawed because
our senses are not perfect???
My senses cannot directly experience infrared light, or
see a microbe, yet science can, thus proving, that perfect
senses are NOT a requirement for discovering our universe.
Science is an excellent tool for verifying things in a multitude
of ways, including sensory. This accumulation of data,
including sensory, instrumental, data, etc, combined give
us a level of confidence for what we accept as fact.
Nothing in science is 100% fact. Unlike religion, it is always
OPEN to being proven wrong, or clarified.
The bigger the pile of the evidence, the stronger our
case for what we are theorizing.
Where is the pile for god? The BIGGEST extraordinary claim
any man can come up with.
peace
axeman
Quote from axeman:
"I have no choice to reject your entire reply, since it is rejecting
reason while at the same time USING reason to make your case, thus making it completely contradictory."
Of course you had a choice, and you made it. Your comments demonstrate intellectual dishonesty on your part when you say you have no choice.
"I have no choice to reject your entire reply, since it is rejecting
reason while at the same time USING reason to make your case, thus making it completely contradictory."
Of course you had a choice, and you made it. Your comments demonstrate intellectual dishonesty on your part when you say you have no choice.
I AM THE LORD THY GOD.
I noticed this discussion, and I'd like to thank all my faithful supporters on Elite Trader. I bless you, my children.
A few thousand years ago, I commanded my loyal servant Abraham to mutilate his own genitalia. He did so without a moment's hesitation. Great guy that Abraham, he was even willing to sacrifice his favorite son to me. Today I command thee a relatively easy task. I hereby command all my faithful servants to present to me 10% of all your assets as a tithe.
I demand that every one of you Paypal this sum without delay to reardenmetal444@yahoo.com . You must make this known to all your friends and relatives as well, for I am the Lord thy God, and this is my will.
Now, those wicked among you may say "But how do I know that this is really the word of the Almighty Lord, and not some guy pretending to speak in his name"?
My answer, my children is this: You must believe these words for exactly the same reason as you believe in the Bible. Faith.
I have spoken.
I noticed this discussion, and I'd like to thank all my faithful supporters on Elite Trader. I bless you, my children.
A few thousand years ago, I commanded my loyal servant Abraham to mutilate his own genitalia. He did so without a moment's hesitation. Great guy that Abraham, he was even willing to sacrifice his favorite son to me. Today I command thee a relatively easy task. I hereby command all my faithful servants to present to me 10% of all your assets as a tithe.
I demand that every one of you Paypal this sum without delay to reardenmetal444@yahoo.com . You must make this known to all your friends and relatives as well, for I am the Lord thy God, and this is my will.
Now, those wicked among you may say "But how do I know that this is really the word of the Almighty Lord, and not some guy pretending to speak in his name"?
My answer, my children is this: You must believe these words for exactly the same reason as you believe in the Bible. Faith.
I have spoken.
Quote from axeman:
"If I were to accept your premise that reason is not
a valid tool, then I am forced reject your argument."
There was no rejection of reason or logic on my part when reason and logic relate to the subject of the material and limited world. I am in favor of the use of relativistic material logic as it relates to that which exists in duality, time and space, and material causality.
However, when discussing God, who by definition is beyond anything that is limited in nature. This means beyond time and space, beyond causation, beyond relativistic logic due to His absolute nature. What I am suggesting is that continued use of relativistic logic when discussing God is as useful as application of the sense of smell in trying to understand what it is to hear a symphony.
All material, relativistic logic is based on the concept of time and space. In this world, everything is bound by these laws of time and space. Everything exists at a particular point, at a particular time.
My definition of God is that God is the exact opposite of this world. God is not limited by space and time, He is omnipresent and He is eternal. In effect this means that God doesn't exist at a particular point at a particular time, rather the opposite. He exists everywhere all the time. There is no place that God isn't, and there is no time that God isn't, or wasn't or won't be.
Our understanding of all things is in this world is relativistic, meaning we understand one thing in relationship to other things. The very nature of the intellect is to look at the parts and differentiate between them. The intellect is not a tool for seeing unity, it is a tool for creating separation between parts.
Since God is everything, absolute, and eternal, the tools which people use to understand this world do not apply to understanding this entirely different situation that is completely opposite to the situation that is known via the senses and the intellect.
Since you have a concept of reality that is limited to physical sense and limited intellect and logic, it would of course not make any sense to you. In the same way that discussing the pleasure of music would make no sense to a deaf man. The deaf man has no frame of reference.
The intellect, physical senses, and relativistic logic have no ability to know or understand their opposite, so it sounds unreasonable to them, and they naturally reject it.
The question then follows, is man more than physical senses and relativistic logic?
You can only answer this question when you look to your own life, and being honest with yourself, admit that there is more to humanity and human experience than pure relativistic logic and sensory input.
People can deny this, but denial has little to do with the truth of a situation.
Man has a choice when to apply the intellect, and when to apply faith. Both are integral aspects of man's personality. Faith in God brings union with God, where intellectualism brings separation from God.
It is the height of intellectual development for the intellect to realize and accept its own limitations, and begin to seek beyond its own boundaries. This is where spiritual progress begins.
"If I were to accept your premise that reason is not
a valid tool, then I am forced reject your argument."
There was no rejection of reason or logic on my part when reason and logic relate to the subject of the material and limited world. I am in favor of the use of relativistic material logic as it relates to that which exists in duality, time and space, and material causality.
However, when discussing God, who by definition is beyond anything that is limited in nature. This means beyond time and space, beyond causation, beyond relativistic logic due to His absolute nature. What I am suggesting is that continued use of relativistic logic when discussing God is as useful as application of the sense of smell in trying to understand what it is to hear a symphony.
All material, relativistic logic is based on the concept of time and space. In this world, everything is bound by these laws of time and space. Everything exists at a particular point, at a particular time.
My definition of God is that God is the exact opposite of this world. God is not limited by space and time, He is omnipresent and He is eternal. In effect this means that God doesn't exist at a particular point at a particular time, rather the opposite. He exists everywhere all the time. There is no place that God isn't, and there is no time that God isn't, or wasn't or won't be.
Our understanding of all things is in this world is relativistic, meaning we understand one thing in relationship to other things. The very nature of the intellect is to look at the parts and differentiate between them. The intellect is not a tool for seeing unity, it is a tool for creating separation between parts.
Since God is everything, absolute, and eternal, the tools which people use to understand this world do not apply to understanding this entirely different situation that is completely opposite to the situation that is known via the senses and the intellect.
Since you have a concept of reality that is limited to physical sense and limited intellect and logic, it would of course not make any sense to you. In the same way that discussing the pleasure of music would make no sense to a deaf man. The deaf man has no frame of reference.
The intellect, physical senses, and relativistic logic have no ability to know or understand their opposite, so it sounds unreasonable to them, and they naturally reject it.
The question then follows, is man more than physical senses and relativistic logic?
You can only answer this question when you look to your own life, and being honest with yourself, admit that there is more to humanity and human experience than pure relativistic logic and sensory input.
People can deny this, but denial has little to do with the truth of a situation.
Man has a choice when to apply the intellect, and when to apply faith. Both are integral aspects of man's personality. Faith in God brings union with God, where intellectualism brings separation from God.
It is the height of intellectual development for the intellect to realize and accept its own limitations, and begin to seek beyond its own boundaries. This is where spiritual progress begins.