Proving God to be fake... In under ten seconds...

Originally posted by John Nada
If an intelligence exists that somehow created the Universe then it is not aware of us, just as we're not aware of things so small they might as well not exist. Believing and worshipping is futile because you are still going to die, and there is no afterlife waiting for you. You got life, that is the gift, the biggest punch in the stomach is that it wont last forever. All these memories and thoughts and they don't matter, they will one day cease to be and your consciousness will forever be gone.

I'm hoping technology will reach a stage where we can move our brains to a computer and live forever, but we were probably born in the wrong time frame for that. Plus the fact that even then the Universe will not last forever so that is also futile, eventually the lights will go out and it's game over for the whole show.

As for believers? I doubt for one second there wouldn't be one of you who'd jump at the chance of living forever if it were suddenly offered to you. That in itself makes the idea of looking forward to an afterlife a mockery. That plus I don't need a fear of God to make me a good person.

I can't believe in a God where I read about a teenager who put a cat in a microwave to "see what would happen".

I can't believe in a God when at a wedding I attended as we left the bride and groom were attacked by a bunch of yobs, ruining the day "under God". These pricks don't deserve to live never mind an afterlife.

I can't believe in God when we can watch objects bigger than our planet smash into Jupiter and then still believe there's a purpose to all this. Us witnessing it or not it still would've happened, and there's far larger events happening out there that make us insignificant.

I can't believe in a God when one day any numerous of events will come along and wipe us out, just like when we accidentally step on a bug it'll be as insignificant as that (do all these creatures go to heaven?). A meteorite will one day come and take us out. If we deal with that then one day the sun will die. If we somehow got out of the solar system then then next one we got to will one day die and so on and so forth until the day comes when the Universe and everything in it will die.

There is no purpose to life, you're just here, so just enjoy it. Or be a depressive and don't enjoy it, because it wont matter as you're going to die anyway. Just don't waste it believing crap.

Gaining consciousness is both our blessing and our curse. It gave us intelligence to do so many things but it also made us aware of our own death, something no animal should have to suffer. We needed to create religion to help us sleep at night, it's just unfortunate that as we've got even smarter that necessary creation is becoming less and less able to hold up.

I would love to be a believer, life would be so much easier to handle without having fear of death.

Sorry for the self indulgent ramble.

No need to apologize. You gave a realistic-looking perspective.

[edit on 22-2-2009 by John Nada]

[edit on 23-2-2009 by Knowledgeforall]

[edit on 23-2-2009 by Knowledgeforall]

Can't get the post fixed.
Here it is separately.

No need to apologize. You gave a thoughtful, realistic-looking perspective.

Originally posted by Good Wolf
To have this debate it would help to have a clear definition to freewill. For the sake of the argument would you define it?

1. The ability or discretion to choose; free choice: chose to remain behind of my own free will.

2. The power of making free choices that are unconstrained by external circumstances or by an agency such as fate or divine will.

Basically to have a choice at all is to have free will. If anything, most people do not realize all the choices they make, especially choices they make subconsciously without thinking.

For example. The poker game again. You are subconsciously giving away your free will to play the game of poker. You don't look at in those terms, but you do. Anytime you subject yourself to any laws and rules, then you are giving away your free will. Every second of this reality, you are subconsciously agreeing to the rules of this reality etc.

To have any choice at all requires free will. Even if you were to suggest it's just action and reaction and the only choice is to continue to stop the reality, that single 1 choice is huge. Most people don't realize it. But after my programming experiences where I have to program all the choices and things a program does, it is huge. You can't get a program to make a choice at all. The closest thing you can do is generate a pseudo random number and then have it select a preformed choice based on the number generated. In which case you have a 10% of 1 reaction, 20% of another reaction and on up.

This is why AI is called artificial and why it is not real intelligence. It's great at following the logic given to it. It can do amazing things that simulate the things intelligence does. But is a simulation and can be made without actual intelligence defining the logic for it.

The funny thing to me is that the argument the atheists are using is actually a scenario in which there has to be a god/creator to things. If they are a program or result of creation, then there has to be a creator. The theory of everything existing is actually less a case for god.

However it also doesn't disprove god either, and is more in line with the understandings of spirituality. Such pretty much has to exist logically because we being consciousness beings that have choice and free will means that all the requirements for that choice and free will have in fact been meet, which is all possibilities.

If there were no god, then we being conscious beings of the universe are god. Of course, as I don't remember creating everything, then that also hints to the fact that there is a higher intelligence to things, even if it were just a deeper part of my consciousness(which we are all connected to in soul). And thus we have the father and son relationship.

John 14:20 - At that day ye shall know that I am in my Father, and ye in me, and I in you.

Well yes and no. The film thing was just an FYI. Science has some simple explanations for NDEs, some parts of the experiences are completely recreatable in the lab (like the feeling of peace and euphoria).

Ok, well I was aware of it. But it is your eyes that only see 24 frames per second. The movie film just goes across the light, and fills up the entire 24 frames per second. Stays in sync with your 24 frames per second because it fills up the space between frames, and then runs constant, so you sync up with it.

If you ever do any gaming, you will see people wanting more than 24 frames per second on their game. And there will always be someone thinking they are slick and they will say, "oh your eyes only see 24 frames per second, anything more than that is a waste". Meanwhile others will say they can tell a difference above 24 frames per second. Which is true? The ones who can tell a difference. They can tell a difference because while that 24 frames did occur in 1 second, it did not happen evenly or in sync with your perspective. So it may have done the 24 frames over the first half second, then none after that half second and you see and get lag. You don't see blank spots, because like the movie film the last frame shows through it all(59/60hrtz or whatever setting your monitor is anyway, enough that it's pretty much the same thing). Thus the higher frame rate gives you a higher chance of having 24 updates in sync with your eyes. Movies don't have this problem because they run at certain constant speeds.

Which means, of the already limited perception we have of things, even in a second of time we aren't seeing all of everything. And this is interesting.

Imagine you are on a boat. The ocean has a bunch of waves, but they are all at the same frequency, IE: they are the same size and come at the same time. Ok, lets say that the man on the boat is only able to see 1 frame every 5 seconds. And of course, lets say that the frequency of these waves has the waves peaking every 5 seconds. If you did this, even though the man was actually moving up and down in the waves, to him it would appear it was all solid, and there were no waves.

If you then take that same man, and now he only sees the bottom of the wave, he would again see the wave as being completely solid, not even a wave and never changing. But his reality would be completely different, even though he was viewing the same wave, even though both see them as being solid. Thus, a separate dimension.

Only if he is out of sync with the frequency of the wave does it become a wave. When in sync, it appears solid. Always the same thing. So the dimension or physical we are in would be the part we are in sync.



[edit on 23-2-2009 by badmedia]

reply to post by atlasastro

GW saw your post where you referenced determinism, you conveniently left out the compatabalists that see free will as ok. Come on Buddy, express your faith in one school, but be a man about it.

Classical determinism says

If a free action is defined as one that is not predetermined by prior causes, then determinism, which claims that human actions are predetermined, rules out the possibility of free actions.

Compatabilists (soft determinism) as your well aware, believe that free will and determinism are not mutually exclusive. They resolve the problem by redefining

a free act in a way that does not hinge on the presence or absence of prior causes.

en.wikipedia.org...

When free acts/will is redefined, then it becomes a completely different discussion, one which I need not mention.

reply to post by badmedia

1. The ability or discretion to choose; free choice: chose to remain behind of my own free will.

On this account, freewill is equal to choice. Choice is a logical process that is deterministic. This definition doesn't help much.

2. The power of making free choices that are unconstrained by external circumstances or by an agency such as fate or divine will.

Now we're getting somewhere. The problem arises because there is no know means for choices to be "unconstrained" both external and internal circumstances.

Basically to have a choice at all is to have free will. If anything, most people do not realize all the choices they make, especially choices they make subconsciously without thinking.

You don't think that choice can be virtual or an illusion? That what appears to be choice is just the time that we spend deciding on how to act in response to the environment?

Ok, well I was aware of it. But it is your eyes that only see 24 frames per second. The movie film just goes across the light, and fills up the entire 24 frames per second. Stays in sync with your 24 frames per second because it fills up the space between frames, and then runs constant, so you sync up with it.

Er no. Human eye frame rate is often put around 60-80fsp (I've seen the 72fps figure a lot over the years). Anywho, the fact is that we don't see in frames.

Even though computers, video and film works on distinct frames, sampled at discrete points in time, there are no evidence suggesting that the human visual system works in the same way. Therefore, it is impossible to express the limitations of human perception as a given maximum framerate.

en.wikipedia.org...

Only if he is out of sync with the frequency of the wave does it become a wave. When in sync, it appears solid. Always the same thing. So the dimension or physical we are in would be the part we are in sync.

Ah, now who's getting anal, ae? The syncing issues are examples of the wagon wheel effect, aka Stroboscopic Artefacts.

Game!

[edit on 23/2/2009 by Good Wolf]

Originally posted by Good Wolf
You don't think that choice can be virtual or an illusion? That what appears to be choice is just the time that we spend deciding on how to act in response to the environment?

How could it be an illusion? To what is the illusion presented to, and why would such a deception be needed?

If it was virtual or an illusion, then that means it would be a lie. So why is the lie needed? Where do we get the ability to think at all? Programs don't "think", they follow out the patterns given as quickly as possible. There is no observer, no thinking, no understanding, no illusion. So if it is an illusion, then what is the purpose of the illusion?

Now when you look at how society works today, then people do think they are free when they are not. And so there is an illusion, but these people give away their free will. In fact, huge amounts of resources are poored into this manipulation and propaganda just to control peoples will. How and why would such a thing exist if we didn't have free will and choice?

Er no. Human eye frame rate is often put around 60-80fsp (I've seen the 72fps figure a lot over the years). Anywho, the fact is that we don't see in frames.

Even though computers, video and film works on distinct frames, sampled at discrete points in time, there are no evidence suggesting that the human visual system works in the same way. Therefore, it is impossible to express the limitations of human perception as a given maximum framerate.

It may be possible, however, to investigate the consequences of changes in framerate for human observers. The most famous example may be the wagon-wheel effect, a form of Aliasing in time, where a spinning wheel suddenly appears to change direction when its speed approach the framerate of the image capture/reproduction system.

Different capture/playback systems may operate at the same framerate, and still give a different level of "realism" or artefacts attributed to framerate. One reason for this may be the temporal characteristics of the camera and display device.

en.wikipedia.org...

Well, I guess I should make myself more clear. It's the rate needed for things to be fluid and without lag and such. I'm also talking about how many the brain processes as well. It's possible the eyes collect more than is processed. Which would explain the part where you mention the eyes are always collecting.

Because I'm pretty sure these rates increase in times of adrenaline and is what gives us the effect of time slowing down. I also remember a thing on something like mythbusters(don't think it was actually that show though) where they used a device that flashed numbers real fast, and they would try to read the number as they were dropped on a bungee cord thing. And they were able to get the number right or close to right during the drops from the slow motion effect of time.

So I'm pretty sure the effect is there. And the cool stuff isn't exactly the eyes itself, it's the way things of frequencies sync up and such.

reply to post by badmedia

and why would such a deception be needed?

Deception may not be intentional. Most illusions are incidental and are instances of the limitations of our perception.

Getting back to it, we can choose to act on something, but that doesn't make it a free act or free will. As I said, choices are logical processes, so they follow causality, so are deterministic and therefore are not freewill.

The illusion happens when you decide to equate choice and freewill.

Originally posted by Good Wolf
reply to post by badmedia

 

and why would such a deception be needed?

Deception may not be intentional. Most illusions are incidental and are instances of the limitations of our perception.

Getting back to it, we can choose to act on something, but that doesn't make it a free act or free will. As I said, choices are logical processes, so they follow causality, so are deterministic and therefore are not freewill.

The illusion happens when you decide to equate choice and freewill.

How do you decide(choose) to equate it to choice and freewill? To decide is to choose.

Funny how my simple and elegant post completely refuting the ridiculous notion that God couldn't know the future because people have free will has been deleted. Real objective site we run here, fellas...

reply to post by badmedia

How do you decide(choose) to equate it to choice and freewill? To decide is to choose.

Very astute of you. You equated them when you defined freewill with excess "choice".

Originally posted by Good Wolf
reply to post by badmedia

 

How do you decide(choose) to equate it to choice and freewill? To decide is to choose.

Very astute of you. You equated them when you defined freewill with excess "choice".

Taking the word out doesn't change the meaning. You are still implying I made a choice.

reply to post by badmedia


Let's go a different route.

Choice.

Choice consists of the mental process of thinking involved with the process of judging the merits of multiple options and selecting one of them for action.

en.wikipedia.org...

In short, any choice is determined by the circumstances on which it is based.

Freewill cannot have such deterministic properties or it will cease to be freewill, therefore freewill and 'choice' can't be used interchangeably because they mean different things.

[edit on 23/2/2009 by Good Wolf]

Originally posted by Good Wolf

Classical determinism says

If a free action is defined as one that is not predetermined by prior causes, then determinism, which claims that human actions are predetermined, rules out the possibility of free actions.

This is itself a redefining of free will via the school of thought, determanism. Determanism did not define free will. Perhaps all new definitions need not be mentioned. Determanism redefined free will as primarily being an illusion, due to all acts being the consequence of prior acts, causes etc.
This school of thought challenged the previous philosophies. It redefined free will.

When free acts/will is redefined, then it becomes a completely different discussion, one which I need not mention.

Only to you. Because it does not suit your beliefs.

[edit on 23-2-2009 by atlasastro]

I have to get this out and onto the post. Think for a minute. You once again are that all powerful being we are arguing about. You have need of nothing. You know the consequences of what you are about to do quite well. You see all the implications and difficulties man will endure. You are about to bring into existence a chain of events that only you can see from the beginning to the end. There is nothing that you cannot accomplish and what you will, will be done. Knowing this all...The beginning to the end you create...To reassure man that you know what is going on and there is a plan and purpose to his existence you make sure that he gets a book to explain your plan and why things are the way they are now. And you tell them how it will end. To re-assure them more you send your son at a moment in their time to bring them hope and show them how to live. I don't know it seems like a really huge plan you have there.

Originally posted by Good Wolf
Your twisting these simple concepts to make them fit together. So much so that you're not talking about freewill or omniscience any more. If what we do is predictable, even to God, our actions are based on cause and effect. If that's true then our will is not free but deterministic, limited to reactions to environmental ques. Not free.

I've been trying to explain this for some time now, but badmedia has a different perspective of the universe.
We are a result of the universe and can only do what is predictable within those laws.
Simple.

Originally posted by atlasastro
How could it start it? Why was there a possibility that something could come from nothing, yet the reverse possibility, that the nothing continues without a something spontaneously erupting is non-preventable.

You're making the same flaw of assumption as most religious and even non-religious people do.
Why does there have to be a 'time' when there was nothingness for our universe to exist?
Forget about "nothing". It's irrelevant when talking about a source (perhaps a multiverse) outside our Universe which is OUTSIDE the 4th dimension and therefor eternal (at least from our perspective).

Originally posted by atlasastro
How did the nothing have a law that said it could not prevent something coming from itself, the nothing? If nothing cannot prevent something then its not nothing, its a something unable to stop something else coming from itself, apparently a nothing, but with an inability to prevent something.

Funny that you don't use the same logic where God's existence is concerned.
Wonder why...
Oh yeah, the eternal thing?
ANYTHING outside our universe would be eternal to us because it would be OUTSIDE of the 4th dimension.

Originally posted by atlasastro
Nice to see the usual suspects, GW, ToothParadox.

Thanks for misspelling my name...
Perhaps you should read it and ponder the meaning, maybe you will realize that no one can solve the riddle of our universe, and therefor should not use assumptions as if they were fact and myth as if it were history.

Originally posted by badmedia
But after my programming experiences where I have to program all the choices and things a program does, it is huge. You can't get a program to make a choice at all. The closest thing you can do is generate a pseudo random number and then have it select a preformed choice based on the number generated. In which case you have a 10% of 1 reaction, 20% of another reaction and on up.

But our brain is essentially a computer.
Our brain runs on variables (causes) to form actions or thoughts.
Our brain is different than any program, because the variables effecting it are much more complicated and intricate. The reason we appear to be more is the fact that we can't see the variables and therefor can not predict the outcome.
Any all knowing God COULD see the variables and predict the outcome, and so we would essentially look like little computers to such a being.
Just trace every action or thought back to "why". All our choices are interlaced within the universe so to speak.
We can't form a thought out of thin air - it MUST have a source...
Follow the source... It's always something external or the result of something external.
Just because you can't see the 'programming' in your head and the 'code' that is running constantly doesn't mean that it doesn't exist or that a 'higher' being couldn't see it.

Originally posted by badmedia
The funny thing to me is that the argument the atheists are using is actually a scenario in which there has to be a god/creator to things. If they are a program or result of creation, then there has to be a creator.

The 'creator' is evolution. Our source is the Universe. Every action we make is created by it and we can not break those laws.

As for what is outside of our Universe, logic can not touch it.

Originally posted by badmedia
If there were no god, then we being conscious beings of the universe are god. Of course, as I don't remember creating everything, then that also hints to the fact that there is a higher intelligence to things, even if it were just a deeper part of my consciousness(which we are all connected to in soul). And thus we have the father and son relationship.

That's a huge stretch... more of a leap really...
There does not need to be a creator.
I don't know if there is a god or not, but you seem to be arguing that our Universe needs a creator.
Science gives us several theories which disagree...

Originally posted by jackflap
I have to get this out and onto the post. Think for a minute. You once again are that all powerful being we are arguing about. You have need of nothing. You know the consequences of what you are about to do quite well. You see all the implications and difficulties man will endure. You are about to bring into existence a chain of events that only you can see from the beginning to the end. There is nothing that you cannot accomplish and what you will, will be done. Knowing this all...The beginning to the end you create...To reassure man that you know what is going on and there is a plan and purpose to his existence you make sure that he gets a book to explain your plan and why things are the way they are now. And you tell them how it will end. To re-assure them more you send your son at a moment in their time to bring them hope and show them how to live. I don't know it seems like a really huge plan you have there.

Hmmmm, I just thought about it...... :bnghd:

Question:

This is how the story (approximately, lol) goes: Lonely man climbs to the top of the mountain and burning bush which mysteriously moves in sync with the breeze recites word of god (that would be His voice-over, of course).

Did you ever asked yourself why all that secrecy (I will not take 13th century cliché "he works in mysterious ways" as reasonable answer)?

One would think that Almighty in his holy infiniteness would certainly have better communication skills developed by now...

Here is my 5 seconds proof that I'm actually better then creator itself: I would NEVER, ever create something to worship ME (unless I needed money, of course)

Originally posted by Grandma
reply to post by John Nada

 

Hello John Nada:

I really do not believe you would like your brain taken out of your body and placed somewhere you could live forever.

Well I would, although of course I'd want an awesome cyborg body, and on top a huge glass jar with my brain floating about that would be great. Or maybe a floating head in a jar like in Futurama, that would be sweet.

I do not need to jump at the chance to live forever, I believe my Creator and Lord, when he tells me that he is making a home for me in heaven. I believe in an afterlife. So, I will live forever. Yes, you are saying it if by faith that I believe this, but it through faith that we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ.

Good for you, I'm glad you sleep well at night. The fact is though that when the moment of truth comes you will fight for your own survival, just like every creature does. If in that moment you're offered the chance of immortality you would take it, there's not a doubt of that in my mind.

I am sorry that someone put a cat in the microwave. That was not because of God not caring about that animal. It was because the heart of the boy was hard and uncaring. I know God is trying to reach out to that boy.

I don't want your sympathy, just pointing out the proof of a godless world.

The same of what happened at your friends wedding. That was terrible and I feel for them, on their special day. But, God was rejoicing on their union together, he didn't cause this bad thing to happen. We live in the world and the Bible tells us that Satan is the prince of this world.

I don't want to believe in a God where people can be scumbags their entire life then just repent at the end and go to "heaven". These pricks I've mentioned above don't deserve to even live, never mind a chance at an afterlife. Plus I doubt I'm in your God's good graces as if I were given a vigilante license to do as I wish I'd take these scumbags down and sleep soundly that same night.

The Universe is a beautiful creation. One that man is still searching for answers to how it all works. Something was made out of nothing. And that something needed a Creator.

Please read Psalms 139:13-16

Drivel. But if it makes you happy great, just like avoiding every other major point in my post makes you happy, it's all good, but at the end of the day we'll both realize you were kidding yourself.

Here's a mind bender for you soul believers. If rich enough people who die can have their bodies frozen so that one day they can be revived when technology catches up. So if your soul goes to heaven then hundreds of years later your body is revived does your soul just get zapped back? Are you a zombie? It's hysterically funny.

Plus cloning. If given the opportunity humans could probably be duplicated right now (and who knows maybe they have been in some underground lab, this is a conspiracy site after all ). Do they both have souls? Just one? Is the other one a zombie? (Awesome movie idea, I'm trade marking it NOW!). Doesn't the notion of introducing something that already exists ruining God's perfect plan?

[edit on 23-2-2009 by John Nada]

reply to post by atlasastro

Only to you. Because it does not suit your beliefs.

Not so much. I find myself with agreeing for the most part with all the determinism varieties. Those that say that human actions are predetermined and that freewill doesn't exist. Then there are the rest that also say that human actions are predetermined and that freewill exists as something else that doesn't violate causality.

A compatibilist, or soft determinist, in contrast, will define a free act in a way that does not hinge on the presence or absence of prior causes.

So either you believe that human actions are predetermined (take your pick of determinism varieties) or your wrong.