Word Perversion Example #7854: Atheism and Its Discontents

[roo_ster]

This thread is a side track from the THR thread The Family vs. the State: Strong Families Are the Only Antidote to the Nanny State

I'm not sure what dmalland means by "nonbelievers"

I think dmalland is in the same boat.

I have a particular dislike of both perversion of word's meanings and neologism used to pervert an already existing word's meaning.

What dmallind has described [rejection of personal god(s) but acknowledging impersonal god(s) or mystical experience(s)] sound a bit like what are popularly called voodoo atheists:
"If you're going to be an atheist when it comes to traditional religion, fine. But don't let me catch you playing with voodoo on the side if you want to be taken seriously."

As for Albert Einstein, AE's writings & quotations could be construed to palce him in the Deist camp.  If AE did not mean "God" when he spoke/wrote, he could have easily used the perfectly respectable word, "nature" or some other word if he wanted to.  English was not his first language, but he became fluent.  Reading his words and doing a mental find/replace with God/something_else does not pass the sniff test.

By the way nonbeliever = atheist. It's pretty simple. Theism is the belief in personal god or gods. If you don't have a belief in any personal god or gods you are atheistic.

The idea (dictionaries give usages not definitions so don't try that either) that atheist only means one who claims any god is impossible is a VERY recent and very wrong one. Have belief in some kind of personal god? You are a theist. Don't? You're an atheist.

So sorry, but I am reminded of something said by Daniel Patrick Moynihan, "Everyone is entitled to their own opinions, but they are not entitled to their own facts."

When you and your buddies get together, you can call a bull a "five-legged-cow" all you want, but it does not make a bull a cow.

theism

One entry found for theism.
Main Entry: the·ism
Pronunciation: 'thE-"i-z&m
Function: noun
: belief in the existence of a god or gods; specifically : belief in the existence of one God viewed as the creative source of man and the world who transcends yet is immanent in the world
- the·ist /-ist/ noun or adjective
- the·is·tic /thE-'is-tik/ also the·is·ti·cal /-ti-k&l/ adjective
- the·is·ti·cal·ly /-ti-k(&-)lE/ adverb

atheist

One entry found for atheist.
Main Entry: athe·ist
Pronunciation: 'A-thE-ist
Function: noun
: one who believes that there is no deity
- athe·is·tic /"A-thE-'is-tik/ or athe·is·ti·cal /"A-thE-'is-ti-k&l/ adjective
- athe·is·ti·cal·ly /-ti-k(&-)lE/ adverb

Atheism in Wikipedia

Atheism, in its broadest sense, is an absence of belief in the existence of gods.

Among proponents of atheism and neutral parties, there are two major traditions in defining atheism and its subdivisions.

The first tradition understands atheism very broadly, as including both those who believe gods don't exist (strong atheism) and those who are simply not theists (weak atheism).

The second tradition understands atheism more narrowly, as the conscious rejection of theism, and does not consider absence of theistic belief or suspension of judgment concerning theism to be forms of atheism.

Theism in Wikipedia

Theism is the belief in one or more deities. More specifically it may also mean the belief that God/god(s) is immanent in the world, yet transcends it.

Wikipedia then provides a handy outline of the most common views on the existence of deities.

Views about the existence of deities are commonly divided into these categories:

Code:

  1. Nontheism: The absence of clearly identified belief in any deity
          * Atheism: It has two distinct, commonly used meanings:
                o Strong atheism: The belief that no deity exists.
                o Weak atheism: An absence of belief in the existence of deities.
          * Agnosticism: The belief that the existence of God or gods is unknown and/or inherently unknowable.
                o Strong agnosticism: The view that the question of the existence of deities is inherently unknowable or meaningless. "It is impossible to say whether or not there is a god"
                o Weak agnosticism: The view that the question of the existence of deities is currently unknown, but not inherently unknowable. "For now, we cannot know. Maybe if we find evidence of god,T"
(B          * Nontheistic religions:
                o Taoism
                o Zen buddhism
   2. Deism: The doctrine that a deity created nature but does not interact with it. This view emphasizes the deity's transcendence.
   3. Theism (second definition): The doctrine God(s) is immanent in the world, yet transcends it:
          * Polytheism: The belief that there is more than one deity.
                o Polytheism proper: The belief there is a distinct pantheon of distinct deities which all are to be worshipped
                o Animism: The belief there are immense amount of deities and spirits, which are to be placated and worshipped.
                o Monolatry: The belief that there is more than one deity, but only one should be worshipped.
                o Henotheism: The belief that there is more than one deity, but one is supreme.
                o Kathenotheism: The belief that there is more than one deity, but only one deity at a time should be worshipped. Each is supreme in turn.
          * Monotheism: The belief that there is only one deity.
                o Inclusive monotheism: The belief that there is only one deity, and that all other claimed deities are just different names for it.
                o Exclusive monotheism: The belief that there is only one deity, and that all other claimed deities are false and distinct from it, either invented, demonic, or simply incorrect.
   4. Panentheism: The belief that the universe is entirely contained within a deity that is greater than just the universe.
   5. Pantheism: The belief that the universe is identical to a deity.

[roo_ster]

dmallind:
So, eliminating the Creator in the Declaration of Independence, The Bill of Rights, and The Constitution, what is the atheistic view on how we were endowed with individual rights? It seems to me that failing to acknowledge a higher power than the state is a slippery slope that eventually leads to totalitarianism, as the state will assume the role of God, or at least paternal benefactor, to allow or disallow rights as it sees fit.

Where do rights come from if not from a higher power? They come from humanity itself. They come from something that is truly and definitionally inalienable - the existence of a human being in human society.  Without getting into a huge diatribe on moral philosophy and the development of ethical codes in human society (call me weird but it's a pet topic for me!), all of them developed remarkably similarly despite very different gods or religions.

You may have a point that there is some underlying survival advantage to particular ethical codes which come to the fore in some societies, but the sentence underlined by myself does not reflect reality.

For just one example, the vast majority of animist religions in sub-saharan africa (SSA) have no ethical content whatsoever.  The (animist belief-holding) SSA societies reflect this, with loyalty and decent treatment extending only to the tribe or in-crowd.  There is no universal value for human life or ethical problems with stealing/raping/whatever, as long as the target is not of the tribe.  That sort of survival "ethics" is described in your words:

Kill the guy who's the best hunter? Less meat for everyone. Rape the wife of the guy who knows which plants to use to treat illnesses? See what happens next time you need a poultice. Steal from the woman who knows where the best vegetables and fruits grow? That part of your diet is going to be lacking.

Kill the other tribe's best hunter, herbalist, or gatherer?  No problem.

Some SSA groups have, however, adopted universalist ethical codes.  Namely, those groups that have become Muslim or been converted to Christianity or have been heavily imprinted by western civ.

Which brings me to my point:  
All these claims to a non-theist, universally transcendant means of, ahh, divining individual rights as we know them come from folks who either live in Western Civilization or have been influenced by W. Civ.  W Civ has been steeped in ethical monotheism (Christianity) for 2000 years.  Even if some have thrown off the flesh of Christianity, the underlying ethical skeleton still exists and informs W Civ.  For a while, at least, until we end our belief in univeral & trancendant rights just as we did Christianity.  Some (marxists, fascists, others) have already cast them aside.

[Guest]

I think you are looking at ethics in too narrow a light and are also attributing too much good to our country with her Christian heritage. Just as you describe your animists as having ethics but only within there tribe, America has offered her freedoms and rights to only whites. I believe the true accomplishment of western society has been to look at ethics as universal and with a certain degree of secularism. We have forsaken a lot of impractical dogmatism that ruled our laws and decision making for a more practical secularistic approach.

Don't get me wrong, I don't think that religion is necessarily bad - for societies or individuals - on the contrary, I think it can be good. But there has to be a balance between allowing religion to satisfy the curiosities that stem from consciousness and the practicality of living in a material universe.

I guess your point is still a little bit off to me... are you arguing that it is necessary for a society to have a Judeo-Christian belief system to sustain our western ideas of freedom and liberty? Or are you using universally transcendant rights as an argument for the existence of god and, probably more specifically, the Christian God?

[zahc]

I use 'atheist' to mean 'strong atheist' or 'someone who believes/asserts that there is no god'. I will continue to do so. There are other words for people who 'do not believe there is a god, or do not know if there is a god' such as agnosticism. Atheism has an -ism on it, I consider it like any other religious belief.

[S_O_Laban]

Jfruser: Your post certainly lays out what I was getting at, in a much more complete and masterful way.  

We each interpert data through the lens of our own experence.   Having read a little of Einstein, his belief in a higher power of great intellengence and design seems obvious..... but if one chooses to redefine atheism then I can see (although not agree)  where one's coming from.

[S_O_Laban]

I use 'atheist' to mean 'strong atheist' or 'someone who believes/asserts that there is no god'. I will continue to do so. There are other words for people who 'do not believe there is a god, or do not know if there is a god' such as agnosticism. Atheism has an -ism on it, I consider it like any other religious belief.

Yes.  To have the faith of a strong atheist is most desireable if properly placed. Given the overwelming evidence found in the natural world around us,  I can only aspire to a level of faith it must take to disreguard the mountain of evidence of Divine Providence.  A strong atheist exercises a level of  religious belief not often found in Christianity today.

[Nightfall]

Given the overwelming evidence found in the natural world around us,  I can only aspire to a level of faith it must take to disreguard the mountain of evidence of Divine Providence.  A strong atheist exercises a level of  religious belief not often found in Christianity today.

Please, share this evidence. The phrase "mountain of evidence" makes me suddenly anxious about my observational skills pertaining to the world, which normally I'm fairly confident in.

[Guest]

dmallind said: "Sweden is 85% atheistic, and does a pretty damn good job of protecting the life and liberty and pursuit of happiness of its citizens."

Whether they are atheistic or not, this is not necessarily a good example. Sweden places a huge tax burden on its citizens and has been on the verge of national bankruptcy for years. Sweden serves as a better example of the failure of even benevolent Socialism.

Also dmallind: "In short, rights come from recognition of humanity in a society of humans, and they develop in remarkably similar ways regardless of the religious belief of the majority of those societies."

That's true in as far as it goes. However, widely varying societies have also developed similar strains of decadence, oppression, tyranny, and genocide. Ironically, in the 20th century, 164,000,000 people were killed by secular, atheistic, dictatorships. The only method that has been successful in protecting the rights of the individual is when the origin of those rights has been removed from human hands. This is crucial in maintaining those rights in that, if something larger than man endowed those rights, than only something larger than man can remove them. Any human attempt to abridge or rescind those rights is recognized as tyranny and treated as such, or at least it used to be.  

Moreover, human history reveals to us that, regardless of the intent, human institutions ultimately descend into a power struggle between factions. Indeed, this is what caused most of the bloodshed in the name of Jesus. Without the understanding that man is not the ultimate power in the universe, the fate of the individual is left to the whim of the human institution we recognize as 'the government' which, as we know, can turn from beneficial to terrifying within a matter of weeks.

[roo_ster]

I guess your point is still a little bit off to me... are you arguing that it is necessary for a society to have a Judeo-Christian belief system to sustain our western ideas of freedom and liberty? Or are you using universally transcendant rights as an argument for the existence of god and, probably more specifically, the Christian God?

My intent was more to disprove a secular, faith-less means of deriving transcendent, universal human rights (TUHR) than to prove anything.

As to your specific questions, certainly not the latter.  As to the former, I believe that J-C belief was a necessary (but not sufficient) ingredient to get to our current conception of TUHR.

If you want me to make a point, my point is that there are no secular, empirical examples of TUHR.  That what we think of as such derive from Western Civilization, of which Christianity has played a huge part.  To be blunt, no non-western culture has come to value TUHR without either being conquered by some subset of W Civ or otherwise heavily influenced by W Civ.

I would assert that the combination of Christian emphasis on the inherent value of every being made in God's image, combined with Greek & Roman ideas of democratic and republican rule, leavened with a heavy dose of Anglo-Saxon personal sovereignty, and given time for those to steep and contend with one another...lead us to our contemporary belief that there is such a thing as TUHR.  

I would further assert that TUHR are quite the exception in human history and geogrgaphy.  I would argue that the idea of TUHR is a fragile one that plants the seeds of its own destruction, as our philosophers try to abstract TUHR from its messy, disorderly roots and repackage it as a secular philosophy cut off from the necessary underpinnings and beliefs...because it can not be adequately explained in secular, darwinian terms without some spark of faith in...something*.  

I do not expect that TUHR will ever hold sway over the majority of the globe, due to the rest of the world's lack of our history.  I also expect one day that the concept of TUHR will not hold sway in the West or the USA.  The secularists will have prevailed, and traded our inheritance for a mess of pottage**.  The only question is, "When?"  Sooner?  Later?  Will there be a re-birth/renewal of faith and liberty before TUHR are snuffed out?

Nothing earthly lasts forever.

Contemporary secular types who try to reason their way to TUHR get tripped up by words that are burdened by western/christian morality.  Right/wrong, good/bad.  Just why is it wrong to murder?  The samurai had no problem with murdering a common peasant and was not brought up on charges or even considered a bad person (unless it was not HIS peasant he murdered, in which case it was damage done to the property of a fellow samurai/daimyo).  No universality there.

There may be survival advantages to be gleaned from treating others with a modicum of respect, but this darwinian calculus says nothing about the intrinsic value of other humans, because it is a calculation: do not rape the herbalist if you want to get that headache cure in the future.  

We may even be hard-wired to work well with others, but hard-wiring to be social does not imply any value to others outside of the social group an individual claims as their own.  It just means that the other person has value...as it pertains to service they can perform for self or group.  For example, the aged widows of Arapaho warriors who fell in battle not only were not looked after when their husbands died, all the property formerly owned by the warrior was divvied up and hauled  off by the other women of the tribe.  The old widow was left to die of exposure, starvation, wandering predators, or whatever.  The Arapaho didn't ascribe to old widows any value.


* Faith in something:  God, Justice, capital "H" Humanity, Non-Aggression Principle.  It just does not work unless you make value-laden judgements.  Just why is it wrong for the strong to exact tribute from the weak, for instance?  TUHR is a faith-based concept.

** It doesn't have to be a secular ascendancy.  Undermining our faith in ourselves so as to allow some other culture unsympathetic to the concept of TUHR will do the trick, too.

[S_O_Laban]

Given the overwelming evidence found in the natural world around us,  I can only aspire to a level of faith it must take to disreguard the mountain of evidence of Divine Providence.  A strong atheist exercises a level of  religious belief not often found in Christianity today.

Please, share this evidence. The phrase "mountain of evidence" makes me suddenly anxious about my observational skills pertaining to the world, which normally I'm fairly confident in.

You can see the stars, the moon, and the sun as well as I.

Perhaps your anxiety stems from the disconnect between what you have chosen to believe and what the mountain of evidence is telling you.

[Perd Hapley]

For a while, I wasn't sure why the heavenly bodies are taken as signs of God's handiwork, but the Psalms say that they "cry out" or some-such.  However, the ancients spent quite a bit of time and effort in studying their movements, so their regular, dependable movement must have been, and remains, evidence that some Divine hand arranged them.

I think the complexity of living things is FAR more convincing, though.

The mountain of evidence can be quite literal, in that something had to create the mountains (the rocks) and the trees, grasses, animals and people that inhabit them.  Furthermore, someone had to create a world-wide, self-regulating system whereby breathable atmosphere and drinkable water is available, to say nothing of minerals and nutrients in the soil, which feeds the plants, which feed the animals, which feed the people.  The obvious answer to the question of origins is design, which is why various cultures around the world had stories of how divine beings created the world.

The evolutionary answer takes an extremely long way around, and that answer gets more convoluted the more it stretches to fit the new complexities we discover.  Had Darwin access to the scientific instruments and scientific knowledge we have today, there is some question whether he would have put his theory.  To Darwin, simple life forms were apparently just that.  Today, some will tell you that these simple life forms are like highly advanced computers, combined with highly efficient manufacturing plants, with distribution and transportation systems.  Darwin could not see that, so it seemed probable to him that such life forms could emerge from chaos.  

As in other threads, I will quote Hank Hanegraff:  "Belief in evolution is no longer feasible in an age of scientific enlightenment."

[Nightfall]

Given the overwelming evidence found in the natural world around us,  I can only aspire to a level of faith it must take to disreguard the mountain of evidence of Divine Providence.  A strong atheist exercises a level of  religious belief not often found in Christianity today.

Please, share this evidence. The phrase "mountain of evidence" makes me suddenly anxious about my observational skills pertaining to the world, which normally I'm fairly confident in.

You can see the stars, the moon, and the sun as well as I.

Perhaps your anxiety stems from the disconnect between what you have chosen to believe and what the mountain of evidence is telling you.

You look at the sun, moon, and stars, and see divine beauty and craftsmanship. I look at them and see gravity at work. Beyond that, I see our current understanding of it, and the step by step progress weve made over many years to improve that understanding. I further see no logical reason why this progress will not continue as it has until we understand everything.

Perhaps my anxiety stems from how absolutely infuriating I find the concept of a deity. Something that cannot be observed, tested, or therefore proven or disproved. Even if we successfully find that grand unified theory of everything, and we understand every bit of the physical& all it takes is somebody standing up and saying God does it all. We could spend countless millennia repeatedly testing our theory of everything, and unfailing demonstrate an understanding of all actions that take place. To me it would prove that these events were not arbitrarily guided by any omniscient conscience, but happened within the confines of universal laws. Basic, irrefutable rules of physical existence. But somebody could simply say God makes it so consistent and due to the nature of God, nobody could offer definitive proof to the contrary.

But therein lies the double edged blade. Due His properties (he has no absolute, defining property, basically a blank variable able to be anything at any time), while I can never disprove Gods existence, neither can you prove it. Supposedly I cant really call you illogical for belief in God because it cant be scientifically disproved. But on the other side of the token, you cannot chastise me for not believing because you can offer no observable proof, no reason to believe. You can offer no evidence to the positive, as I can offer none to the negative. You cannot point to something and say there is God without me being able to offer a counter explanation that will be equally valid, because so long as God as an undefinable argument is accepted, any other undefinable argument (in this case in opposition) must hold the same value. Not to do so would amount to an unparalleled double standard. Its truly an impasse, to which no side can be definitively right or wrong.  

So I guess for all eternity well just have to shrug our shoulders, shake hands and agree solely that we both deserve the freedom to disagree.

[S_O_Laban]

I appreciate you spending the time to better explain why you feel/believe the way you do.  Am I right in understanding you basicly reject the concept of a God/higher life form?

For the record:  I do believe in a God.  I believe he is observable and that evidence of His existence is overwhelming and irrefutable.  That He reveals Himself to us in all that He has created and in the study of the physical world around us are many clues as to the type of being He is.  If disagree we must,  let it be as friends.

[cosine]

Basic, irrefutable rules of physical existence.

One thing that always puzzled me is: What is the cause of the basic, irrefutable rules of physical existance? Where did they come from? How did they spring into existance?

[Nightfall]

I appreciate you spending the time to better explain why you feel/believe the way you do.  Am I right in understanding you basicly reject the concept of a God/higher life form?

Yep. Personally, Ive never experienced anything at all that would indicate a higher presence. Opposite, if anything. Furthermore, Ive never heard any argument to make me reconsider the possibility. I see no magic or divinity in the world. Ive never encountered anything Ive thought beyond the possibility of explanation. Work hard enough, long enough, and the answer is here, not up there(to me anyway). I guess its just a matter of the angle we perceive the world thru. You and I just choose different tools to make sense of our existence, if you will.

[Nightfall]

cosine, if I could answer that, I'd be busy telling Stephen Hawking how I want him to polish my Nobel prize. Perhaps it has to do with the way our universe was created. The manner in which the physical came into being decided what could be done with it, like how the materials you use to make something dictates what is possible with it.

[zahc]

"I further see no logical reason why this progress will not continue as it has until we understand everything."

The modern world has come to worship science, because it has done so much for us. But science cannot answer all questions. I'm a physics student, and I still believe this. Science will never answer all questions. Science sucks at answering 'why', and it will never suceed. Why does the apple fall down? Science says, because of gravity. What causes gravity? Well, we know there are three fundamental forces in the universe. Strong, Weak, Gravity.

Why?

Apparently, because that's the way God made it. You can keep asking 'why' forever. Eventually you come up against not only unknowns, but unknowables. This appears philosophically inevitable to me. Some questions are outside the domain of science. Science deals with observable and disprovable questions and entities. All others are outside the domain of science. Someone here expressed frustration with the concept of a diety...I'm frustrated too, yet, the concept exists and is inevitable, in whatever form you place it. 'God' is not disprovable with science, it's simply outside the domain of science.

Attempting to use science to answer questions improper for scientific analysis weakens and perverts science.

There is a wonderful little show, called Haibane Renmei, that takes place in a mysteriously walled city. The characters never escape the walls, or learn anything useful about what may be beyond them or even what they mean. They never show what is outside the walls! This angered me at first. It lacked resolution. Then I realized what is outside the walls represents not only the unknown, but the unknowable, and that the frustration is completely natural. I hated that show. Enought to buy it on DVD.

[cosine]

cosine, if I could answer that, I'd be busy telling Stephen Hawking how I want him to polish my Nobel prize. Perhaps it has to do with the way our universe was created. The manner in which the physical came into being decided what could be done with it, like how the materials you use to make something dictates what is possible with it.

Okay, but how was the physical caused? How did it come into being?

[Iain]

Okay, but how was the physical caused? How did it come into being?

The fact that not one human being alive can answer that fully and comprehensively is not an argument for the existence of a god.

Maybe someone will answer that question someday. Someone figured out those giant death-dealing flashes from the sky.

[cosine]

Okay, but how was the physical caused? How did it come into being?

The fact that not one human being alive can answer that fully and comprehensively is not an argument for the existence of a god.

Okay, it may not be an argument for the existance of a god, but can you give me some reasons why it is not so rather than just saying it is not so?

[Ron]

Nightfall wrote:Basic, irrefutable rules of physical existence.

I don't have the faith to believe that chaos + time = order or that inanimate matter in a state of chaos + time = sentient personality.

If something in science seems impossible they just ascribe a long time period for it to take place as if all chaos needs is some time to "work" it all out.

You cannot get 10 minutes into a nature program or book written for the layman without anthropomorphic language being used in relation to supposed natural processes. Science (subconsciously?) imbues inanimate processes with volition in the language it uses regularly. They tip their hat to the force, the will driving life, the One ordering chaos and they don't even realize it.

Personalty and sentience are the big dilemma for modern science. All they can tell us about are the mechanics. At the root to them we are not even brute animals. Sentience/personality is to the materialist scientist nothing more than an illusion that is the byproduct of bio mechanical processes.

Keep scratching at a materialists phlosophy about rights and eventually it will boil down to "might makes right". In other words all human rights derive from the human experience and the State is the final arbitrator of those (so called) rights.

[Iain]

Okay, it may not be an argument for the existance of a god, but can you give me some reasons why it is not so rather than just saying it is not so?

Heard the watchmaker analogy? Basically it says that if you have never seen a watch and you find a watch you don't assume that some random sequence of events threw all that together and created an accurate yet distinguished timepiece for the gentleman about town. Instead you assume that someone made it. Sounds like I'm undermining myself but hang on. There are plenty of analogies that could be used (computers, lcd monitors, sex - I don't understand any of these)

We can demonstrate how some aspects of evolution work (think Darwin's finches or dark and light moths in industrial cities). So it wouldn't be valid to look at a specific finch and say 'wow that suits its environment so perfectly, it just must have been designed that way.' And yet before we understood exactly how natural selection pressures work  that would have been a decent response to have made. Incomplete understanding of how something works does not mean I should assume that someone designed it as it is. It merely means that I don't understand it.

As soon as someone provides an answer to the previously thought unanswerable then the argument has to change. The argument that some things are out of the reach of human knowledge and is god's realm is as old as questions about the bright shiny things in the sky and why the red flickering stuff hurts you when you put your hand in it.

This is an interesting thread, but I sort of wish I hadn't got involved. I stopped my Philosophy and Theology degree after a year, and I now remember exactly why.

As someone who does not believe in any god (at present anyway) I'm very interested in the following from jfruser

Contemporary secular types who try to reason their way to TUHR get tripped up by words that are burdened by western/christian morality

I was raised in a strongly christian household, others I know were not but are equally moral. At least I believe I am a moral person. Clearly western christian beliefs have had large impact on who I am, and who many of my friends are perhaps without us being entirely aware of it. The thought occurs to me that all this may be true, that jfruser's TUHR may entirely stem from christian beliefs. Does that in fact lead us to conclude that this value system is actually based on any universal truths?

We may have created a more 'moral' system than Arapho Indians, but that is partly in our own estimation, an estimation which I do not disagree with. In large part christian morals inform us to do to others as we would have done to ourselves, which are words to live by aside from any christian beliefs. The thing that caused us to generally abide by this was the promise of life everlasting and on the flip side the promise of burny torment everlasting and then some.

So I guess that I'm going to make no effort to extricate TUHR from christianity. It could well be bound up with christian morals and ideas about being created in God's image, but I see no reason personally to throw the baby out with the bathwater. I might have no fear (right now) of eternal torment but I do have a fear of a society that discards all morals that Christians claim as their own.

Just initial thoughts, but there may be no more as my head hurts.

[Ron]

The argument that some things are out of the reach of human knowledge and is god's realm is as old as questions about the bright shiny things in the sky and why the red flickering stuff hurts you when you put your hand in it.

Straw man. I don't know of any serious Christian theologians or professors that advocate not seeking scientific truth.
I don't know of any Christians that think that way either. Painting Christians as Luddites is a common argument devised to make Christians seem a quaint throwback to less enlightened times.

We may have created a more 'moral' system than Arapho Indians, but that is partly in our own estimation, an estimation which I do not disagree with.

Translated: I am a god deciding what is good and evil.

Incomplete understanding of how something works does not mean I should assume that someone designed it as it is. It merely means that I don't understand it.

Incomplete understanding of how God works does not mean you should assume He doesn't exist. It merely means that you do not understand His workings.

We are to trust the new high priests motives and their scientific method as if their belief system would not inform the way they interpret the facts. We are not to challenge their findings or motives because they alone are on an altruistic search for the truth. We are to believe that science alone is not defiled by the basest motivation to exert power over others.  Really, the scientific community really isn't comprised of elitists who want to guide the human race to it's next level of evolution.

[Nightfall]

Okay, but how was the physical caused? How did it come into being?

Big bang, I reckon. I'm sure your next question is about the period before THAT. Well, hell, I dunno. Check back in a few centuries and maybe they'll have a better answer for you.

[Ron]

Big bang, I reckon. I'm sure your next question is about the period before THAT

Why ask about before?

The Big Bang doesn't explain anything clearly. How does chaos turn into order, that which is lifeless come to life and that which is alive become aware?