That's not the point. That is how evolution works, but whether that is worth striving for or not you cannot say. If you take "this species will survive and this won't", and make a moralic statement out of it, you'll go in a very strange direction. A certain group in the first half of the twentieth century around a certain Austrian who also served as a private in the German army during WWI actually tried to think that through. I'm not a fan of them.
In a similar way, a statement can be made that the way the universe was formed involved a great deal of chance.
Actually, no. I will now speak from what I have learned about cosmology at some event of the Ludwig Maximilians University of Munich. Nothing is a state that can be described mathematically. Physicists describe nothing as an unstable state. It is therefore more probable that there is something than that there is nothing. Furthermore, the entire universe consists of zero energy. The philosopher's nothing is a lot less than the physicists nothing, though.
Edit: I hereby retract my statement affirming that 'strenghtening the genepool' is how evolution works, because it's not one-dimensional like that. It's a lot more complicated.
That's not the point. That is how evolution works, but whether that is worth striving for or not you cannot say. If you take "this species will survive and this won't", and make a moralic statement out of it, you'll go in a very strange direction. A certain group in the first half of the twentieth century around a certain Austrian who also served as a private in the German army during WWI actually tried to think that through. I'm not a fan of them.
We're just animals. Like any other on this planet, we just developed a lot of brain mass and now said brain mass is wondering "what's the meaning of life" yet I don't see mice doing anything similar. They just live to survive, as does everything.
From a biological perspective, we are just animals, yes. But who said that survival and reproduction is the purpose of our lives? Evolution theory teaches you nothing but 'Those who survive, reproduce and adjust will still be around. Those who don't will not.' It does not pass any judgement on whether passing your genes on and all that is the right thing to do, or whether it's what you're supposed to achieve. The universe doesn't care whether a species survives or whether I reproduce or not. There is no evidence that the universe cares about anything, the universe just exists. The only people that care are lifeforms or god, who most people here claim does not exist. Therefore, I can decide to do whatever the hell I want with my life. If I wanted to kill myself, I could do so, and no biologist would walk up to me and say 'Hey dude, you're failing your evolutionary mission here.' Science does not give purposes. Science at best tells you what will happen.
There's evidence of evolution. Why would an omnipotent, omnipresent (, etc) being bother guiding natural selection to get the creation he can then FUD with his word when he could've just made the creation immediately. Why would he/she do such a thing!? Why create stuff that you know will make your creation(s) uncertain of your existence when they discover it?
Also, if the meaning of life is something like "to serve God with whole our heart", then what's the purpose of God's existence? "I got this great idea, I'll make humans and force them to believe in me and follow my word to get in heaven, yet give them 'free will' and plant all sorts of fun stuff to make them uncertain about my existence. You know, like a kid with a magnifying glass and an ant hill."
EDIT:
But who said that survival and reproduction is the purpose of our lives?
Nobody. Here's a counter for you. Who said there is a purpose in our lives.
But I never claimed there is a god or a purpose in life. I just pointed out that taking the theory of evolution and trying to interpret it in a way that gives life a purpose is fallacious. And about who said that survival and reproduction was the purpose of our lives:
There's no evidence that there's any "point."
Reproduce, strengthen the gene pool.
I merely added a rhetorical question to underline my objection to WiP's statement.
Like a dream, Life has no meaning other then the meaning you derive from it. Our brains are designed to find patterns and weave narratives about them. This is why sometimes dreams seem to actually follow a plot even though it's your brain routing through all the junk memories in your head. When you wake up, you assign meaning to a dream even though there was no inherent meaning to the dream. Life is like this. A grand dream that we all find our own meaning in but in the end is just a collection of random events. I find the struggle humanity faces to survive and live to be meaning enough, some people need more and some less. In the end, we all die with our own delusions of grandeur.
Furthermore, there is no longer a scientific consensus that the world is deterministic. That was 100 years ago. Random (or seemingly random) events have their place in physics.
If this were true than the entire scientific method would be faulty.
It is true. No one is saying there is no more causality (because that still exists), but there is no more determinism. There is a difference. Study some quantum physics, and we'll talk again.
Look, I don't want to get into a swordfight here, but quantum mechanics is not deterministic. I don't have multiple degrees in physics, I don't have any degree at all.
Okay, I do have a degree in physics and I did take a course in quantum mechanics. Not just a survey course in modern physics (although I took one of those too), and not a "physics for poets" bullshit course, but a real, honest-to-goodness quantum mechanics course. Based on that, I can tell you that you are taking this whole "quantum mechanics means that determinism is out the window" thing we hear from popular TV shows a little too far. Sure, we can't know both the exact velocity and the exact location of an electron at exactly the same time, but that doesn't mean we can't do physics at the subatomic level, nor does it mean we can't make predictions and design experiments to test those predictions. We just have to rely on probability and statistics more than Newton would have liked.
People like to say "determinism is out the window" to make themselves look smart, but the actual region in which quantum effects become significant is removed enough from everyday life as to make this statement equivalent to saying, ""people are fair, just, and equitable". Try an experiment: Throw a pen against a wall. Does it bounce back or do the atoms in the pen align with the atoms in the wall in such a way that it passes through the wall like a ghost? Have you ever seen, heard, or read of a pen passing through a wall? Maybe you like to say that an experimenter alters the experiment through observation. Test that theory. Wish really, really hard that the pen can pass through the wall. Throw it now. Did it pass through? No? Well then, you're not experiencing quantum effects and so you can stop talking about them.
Don't get me wrong hungryjoe, I didn't bring it up to make myself sound smart (because I, no offence, couldn't care less what people on the internet that I have never met think about me), nor to argue that "well, miracles can happen, modern physics say so!!1oneeleven". I brought it up because it is rather important when talking about a (non)deterministic universe or a free will (and I felt that someone implied that I can't have one because science says so), because if everything is 100% deterministic, there is no margin for a human body to act in any way different from what he is fated to act like anymore. Also, quantum physics did cause a lot of philosophical discussion among scientists at the time, and many (Einstein being one of them) just couldn't deal with the fact probability entered the scene. I also never said (or never meant to say) that the fact that probability and statistics enter the scene overthrow science and that science is bullshit. I will most likely have a degree in physics in a few years, and I probably wouldn't go into that direction if I thought it was stupid.
And since you have a degree in physics, let me ask you a sort of Gretchen-question: Do you use solely physical sciences in order to come to conclusions concerning things like what society should be like?
And since you have a degree in physics, let me ask you a sort of Gretchen-question: Do you use solely physical sciences in order to come to conclusions concerning things like what society should be like?
I base my views on what society should be like on what I remember from the "very special" episodes of Punky Brewster.
OK, as no one seems to be left here, except one person that makes it very clear that he does not take me seriously, and I also spend more time here clarifying what I *don't* want to say instead of what I want to say, I will just retreat and re-read Faust.
There's one thing I don't understand about all your positions: Are you arguing against religion as a legitimate field worthy of respect? Or, are you arguing that religion should not exist? If the latter, do you mean that it should not exist in a rational world? Or do you mean that action should be taken?
I have to sort of retract exactly what I said, because I meant something else.
Cremlian and a few others pretty much hit it on the head; no one ever there was a definite "point" to life or even a goal. Life is, in many ways, like a dream. What I meant is not the overarching "the point", it was a "so what are we as humans trying to accomplish". I'm not saying we're set to accomplish anything, nor can we necessarily, but I think that we as humans can continue to try to understand this bizarre universe around us, almost in a paradoxical way. It's like trying to play a video game without a goal. Sometimes it's hard to understand why we keep playing. We set goals for ourselves and try to meet them. It's a constant struggle for becoming more than you once were.
I'm not really arguing for any side in particular; I'm a Christian technically, but moreso because I see a force guiding my life. Whether that's a supreme being or simply natural structures in motion, much in the way African architecture for centuries was guiding by fractal designs, I have no clue.
There's one thing I don't understand about all your positions: Are you arguing against religion as a legitimate field worthy of respect? Or, are you arguing that religion should not exist? If the latter, do you mean that it should not exist in a rational world? Or do you mean that action should be taken?
As for my position: All I am arguing for is that any discussion about religion cannot end after only having spoken about science. Taking only science and trying to use it to prove that religion is stupid is incomplete, because you only talk about the dogma, to use the same terminology as the article.
My position is not really too clear, as I myself am torn between multiple sides. In general, I think I side with religion not because of its particular truth, but because I think it benefits society when done effectively (which it mostly isn't). I do think there is some kind of guiding force, though I am not convinced at all that it is necessarily an all-powerful being watching over us. After all, if an atheist is afraid to go into a church, there must be at least a dash of power within a church, though not necessarily in its truth or morality.
As a cradle Catholic and avid gamer, I'd like to point out that Jesus could not have been a zombie. He obviously had powers after he rose. Our options are 1)he was resurrected and retained previous powers or 2)he's a lich.
Oh, and merry, don't bother arguing your point. Really. Religious discussions don't ever go anywhere here. As far as Scrym are concerned, belief is stupid and not worth talking about unless you're mocking someone or "educating" them about how wrong they are.
Comments
Nothing is a state that can be described mathematically. Physicists describe nothing as an unstable state. It is therefore more probable that there is something than that there is nothing. Furthermore, the entire universe consists of zero energy.
The philosopher's nothing is a lot less than the physicists nothing, though.
Edit: I hereby retract my statement affirming that 'strenghtening the genepool' is how evolution works, because it's not one-dimensional like that. It's a lot more complicated.
Science does not give purposes. Science at best tells you what will happen.
Also, if the meaning of life is something like "to serve God with whole our heart", then what's the purpose of God's existence? "I got this great idea, I'll make humans and force them to believe in me and follow my word to get in heaven, yet give them 'free will' and plant all sorts of fun stuff to make them uncertain about my existence. You know, like a kid with a magnifying glass and an ant hill."
EDIT: Nobody. Here's a counter for you. Who said there is a purpose in our lives.
And about who said that survival and reproduction was the purpose of our lives: I merely added a rhetorical question to underline my objection to WiP's statement.
People like to say "determinism is out the window" to make themselves look smart, but the actual region in which quantum effects become significant is removed enough from everyday life as to make this statement equivalent to saying, ""people are fair, just, and equitable". Try an experiment: Throw a pen against a wall. Does it bounce back or do the atoms in the pen align with the atoms in the wall in such a way that it passes through the wall like a ghost? Have you ever seen, heard, or read of a pen passing through a wall? Maybe you like to say that an experimenter alters the experiment through observation. Test that theory. Wish really, really hard that the pen can pass through the wall. Throw it now. Did it pass through? No? Well then, you're not experiencing quantum effects and so you can stop talking about them.
I also never said (or never meant to say) that the fact that probability and statistics enter the scene overthrow science and that science is bullshit. I will most likely have a degree in physics in a few years, and I probably wouldn't go into that direction if I thought it was stupid.
And since you have a degree in physics, let me ask you a sort of Gretchen-question: Do you use solely physical sciences in order to come to conclusions concerning things like what society should be like?
Furthermore, I do not watch TV.
Cremlian and a few others pretty much hit it on the head; no one ever there was a definite "point" to life or even a goal. Life is, in many ways, like a dream. What I meant is not the overarching "the point", it was a "so what are we as humans trying to accomplish". I'm not saying we're set to accomplish anything, nor can we necessarily, but I think that we as humans can continue to try to understand this bizarre universe around us, almost in a paradoxical way. It's like trying to play a video game without a goal. Sometimes it's hard to understand why we keep playing. We set goals for ourselves and try to meet them. It's a constant struggle for becoming more than you once were.
I'm not really arguing for any side in particular; I'm a Christian technically, but moreso because I see a force guiding my life. Whether that's a supreme being or simply natural structures in motion, much in the way African architecture for centuries was guiding by fractal designs, I have no clue.
Man, that's profound.
As for my position: All I am arguing for is that any discussion about religion cannot end after only having spoken about science. Taking only science and trying to use it to prove that religion is stupid is incomplete, because you only talk about the dogma, to use the same terminology as the article.
My position is not really too clear, as I myself am torn between multiple sides. In general, I think I side with religion not because of its particular truth, but because I think it benefits society when done effectively (which it mostly isn't). I do think there is some kind of guiding force, though I am not convinced at all that it is necessarily an all-powerful being watching over us. After all, if an atheist is afraid to go into a church, there must be at least a dash of power within a church, though not necessarily in its truth or morality.
Oh, and merry, don't bother arguing your point. Really. Religious discussions don't ever go anywhere here. As far as Scrym are concerned, belief is stupid and not worth talking about unless you're mocking someone or "educating" them about how wrong they are.