Smartest Man in America says God exists

I would agree with this one. Since human beings are known to be incapable of imagining/thinking beyond their experiences from their five senses (seeing, hearing, touching, smelling, tasting) and what we call "the 6th sense", God exist, in some way.

Originally posted by karen61560
reply to post by Runciter33

 

High IQ almost always equals crazy or didnt you know that? Ever see " A Beautiful Mind " ? I'd say crazy. Anyone who believes in God is crazy.

Robert Kirkman - "The thing about smart mother #ers is that sometimes, they
sound like crazy mother #ers to stupid mother #ers..."
I have the book, I never did get around to reading it through.

Originally posted by intrptr
reply to post by windword

 

Who created the creator?

Thats like asking how old is the Universe or where does it end?

We don't know.

Edit: Its okay not to know, you know.

edit on 30-12-2012 by intrptr because: additionaL..

Why should I just stop there and accept that there is a creator that exists, if the answer to my question is always, "We don't know"?

There is evidence of a universe, but no evidence that it has a creator, in my opinion. Existence is not proof of a creator. If it were, everyone would believe in God.

reply to post by Wandering Scribe

Well, first, being the "smartest man in America" does not necessarily make his claims any more relevant or true than the normal human being.

Really? I'm going to hold in much higher regard and consideration the opinion of the smartest man in U.S. versus an average joe plumber. I would probably hold, to the highest degree, the opinions of monks who are spending decades in meditation to try and find God that way.

Accepting his work because he is touted as intelligent is a logical fallacy: an appeal to authority.

His works are also opinions and theories, just like everyone else's.

Second, it is a well established fact, outside of theologians, that the Bible is rife with inconsistencies, false history, and inaccurate mathematical, biological, and other scientific "facts." If his theorem is developed on any type of Biblical account, creation science, personal faith, or religious doctrine, then it is inherently false.

If you don't mind, please post these.

2nd, he's saying Genesis is metaphorically applicable to what we find scientifically speaking, so your point is moot anyway.

reply to post by smurfy

Why did the 'intelligent designer' not just throw us the keys, or would that have been too easy?

The devices for creation are also those for destruction. They can be used either way. So yah, you don't trust the keys to "troglodytes" anymore than you would the kids to your family car.

Originally posted by Ryanssuperman
Your thread title is an oxymoron.

Your support for Ron Paul is ironic.

reply to post by windword

Why should I just stop there and accept that there is a creator that exists, if the answer to my question is always, "We don't know"?

I didn't say stop asking, merely that we don't know. In this present form. Or at this stage in our development.

Its like we are in the womb for 9 months and we don't know anything about this world until we are born and grow up and learn about it? From where we are now we don't know anything about the next one either until we die and are "born" into that one too.

Just observing...

Originally posted by karen61560
reply to post by NihilistSanta

 

Laughter" Proof of feeling happy

Tears : Proof of feeling unhappy

Yelling : Proof of feelings of anger.

Shaking and trembling : Proof of fear

Your point again is???????

Do you know much about acting?

reply to post by windword

Sorry I replied twice to your comment.

There is evidence of a universe, but no evidence that it has a creator, in my opinion. Existence is not proof of a creator. If it were, everyone would believe in God.

All systems are in a state of decay according to the Department of Entropy. All things are decaying. Life is the only thing that resists that decay path (for a while). When we develop from an egg into an embryo and grow into a human, when a seed grows into a tree or an egg hatches and makes a lizard, that is the opposite of decay. Even when we break a bone, it heals, right?

Suns may burn out and atoms decay, but life presents us with a difference. Life is different.

reply to post by FlyInTheOintment

Thanks and best to you and yours. The most wonderful thing about the internet to me is the way you can talk to people the world over about answering the great question of Life, the Universe and Everything.

Just by moving my fingers.

When I was a kid we had two cans and some string. --- from a commercial

reply to post by NihilistSanta

So many misunderstandings I agree. Mistaking localization for falsity. The ancients saw the connections in nature and described it to the best of their understanding. You are saying that as our understanding increases we are pushing god out of the universe but in all actuality every stone we look under we find evidence of God this evidence is in the connectivity. The dying mentality is the fatalist who believes in no meaning because its post modern and trendy. I am renewed daily when I see the countless threads connecting us all.

We are only connected through our desired mediums. This is by our invention and in no way constitutes evidence of a designer. The only evidence we see when we flip a stone is that the universe is a crazy and beautiful thing. Within a sea of chaos there is sometimes order, but there is nothing that shows itself to be the way it is by design. There is no evidence of any pre-planning involved in anything that happens here.

To get back on topic, Langon makes a huge leap to say that reality is like a mind, as nothing at all shows that. We have ideas, but when I think of a house I don't believe that an actual house is in my mind. I'm not sure how he can arrive at this conclusion without somehow deceiving himself along the way.

The metaphysical idealism of Bishop Berkely (the philosophy Langon is parroting) is logically valid, but not at all logically sound. The reason he thinks the universe is a mind is because his own mind is all he can know. He thinks the universe is self-aware because he is self-aware. He thinks objects are the thoughts of God because he can think and imagine objects. He's making the common mistake of attributing human qualities to non-human phenomena by anthropomorphizing the entire universe.

Originally posted by grainofsand

Originally posted by windword

Originally posted by NihilistSanta
reply to post by grainofsand

 

It is all theory. Very little is axiomatic but we EXIST. Show me anything that exist that wasn't created. Should be a fairly common occurrence since your THEORY states everything we know sprang into being this way. You ask for evidence and I cite life. You wont accept the evidence because you would have to take a macro-cosmic view which you currently cant do or refuse to because it supports the idea of a creator. It has design, and it has purpose. Form and Function.

Continue to take the reductionist view put forth by others makes no difference to me but to keep on topic I find it strange that the majority of the Greatest Minds have gravitated toward some unified theory for life and the universe. Isaac Newton for instance or Pythagoras. These aren't just some MIT or Oxford professor regurgitating ideas. These are the originators of real scientific thought.

How can you prove whether or not the universe was created or always was? What is it's purpose, form and function?

What is life? Is the earth alive? Is the solar system alive? How does life prove the existence of a creator more or less so that the existence of the universe itself?

If there exists a creator, where does it exist, within the universe, which by definition is all that exists, or outside of the universe? If a "creator" created the universe, what did it use to create it?

Who created the creator?

Again [/yawn] I'm not making the assertions I just see the evidence lacking.
The burden of proof is on the theists making assertions.

You seem to care more about citation than science, I noticed the athiests were as useful as crickets on this thread here:
First molecule of matter.

To assert that faith is without evidence and then demand evidence is... typical of somone of your intellectual level.

''Smartest Man in America says God exists'

Well, I guess that settles it then.

This guy doesn't even have enough logic to think about all the other Gods created by humans.

He's not very smart.

reply to post by WaterBottle

You should debate him then. That would show if your assumption is true.

Who says there are various gods? Another assumption?

Originally posted by grainofsand

Originally posted by Wonders

Originally posted by grainofsand

Originally posted by PaperbackWriter
It doesn't take the smartest man in America to know GOD exists.
"Only a fool has said in his heart, there is no GOD".

Others could equally suggest that only a fool asserts there is a god.
Believers do not 'know', remember what faith is - believing something that cannot be proven.
I do not believe in any gods but do not assert 'there are none' just that neither believers or non-believers can prove it either way.

edit on 30-12-2012 by grainofsand because: Spelling

Faith is not without evidence, faith is not without good works/ fruits, and faith requires sight/understanding, I think you'd understand that if you'd read/scrutinized the bible

Which bit of the Bible do you like the best? The warlike genocidal god in the Old Testament or the fluffy reformed one in the New Testament who for some reason changed his tune to adapt to society?

Personally I think that both are equally valid, you're over-simplifying both to fit your bias.

Originally posted by NihilistSanta

Originally posted by marvinthemartian

Originally posted by windword
reply to post by NihilistSanta

 

This might sound new age-ish but can you draw a feeling?

Of course you can!

Class
I have just spent ages trying to counter this argument and i mean ages(im dyslexic so it takes a while )
And you cut to the quick with one picture
Absolutely class.

People draw their own meaning from art it does not mean that is an accurate portrayal of the artist feeling. How many times does an artist have to defend their art because people drew their own conclusions based on the imagery etc. Art and feelings these are meant to be ethereal in a sense. They speak to intuition not logic. They are subjective not objective.

That was my point God can not be proven objectively its only when you merge logic and intuition that you understand a "big picture" idea like a unified theory of everything.

Munch may have stated what the Scream meant to him but there are other artist who used surrealism for instance where norms are not what they seem.

A talented artist is able to use whatever medium, a painting, poetry, a play or an opera, a book or music to illicit an emotional response.

No one is ever able to convey the exact nature of their thoughts and feelings, because it always all subjective to the individual. Even God is unable to communicate through the Bible and the religions that claim to know the nature of God.

A sunset may provide hope for some and despair for others.

I can tell you that the sky is blue, but I can't be sure that your eyes are seeing the same blue as me.

The only agreement that exist is the agreement that we agree on, whether it's real or not.

reply to post by NihilistSanta


I read through this whole thread--not something I do very often. I thought you did a good job of 'splain'n it. It is not easy to write about and you did a good job. I have tried to once or twice on a few threads around here, but not as well as you did. It is interesting to see that no one hears anyone else around here. It is more a big argument going on all the time in all these threads. I am not fond of getting involved in arguing ---but I do like to read and see who thinks what, I find it interesting. But, today, reading your posts I just wanted to send you a little "Rah Rah SheeshBoomBa" for your loving effort. Or as they say "we speak the same language' -- which I find rare, but alas, it all makes perfect sense why that is so.

reply to post by LesMisanthrope

...there is nothing that shows itself to be the way it is by design. There is no evidence of any pre-planning involved in anything that happens here.

What about the genetic code? It is encoded, right?

Having never left this little rock of a planet to travel anywhere, thats pretty arrogant to say there is no intelligent design. That smacks of the middle ages when the church used to hold that the earth was the center of everything and the sun and stars revolved around it. Aren't you declaring the same thing when you say there is no "creator" out there?

Stuck in the Middle Ages.

Originally posted by Wandering Scribe
reply to post by Wonders

 

even a "pleb" like myself is capable of discerning for herself that God is relevant and true

Which god exactly? There's a whole lot of them out there:

And, once you pick which one, by what measure are the rest not real? And after that, by what special pleading is your god exempt from the reason all the others are imaginary?

To insinuate that there is little evidence for God's existence is saddening considering all the evidence there is

Unfortunately, there is no empirical evidence which points to the existence of a deity. While you cannot disprove the existence of a deity, you can prove that they are unnecessary as a catalyst for current conditions. Which is the stance that physics, chemistry, biology, anthropology, and many other social, physical, and chemical sciences have arrived at.

God is unnecessary, if not nonexistent.

Vaccinations are bad, fluoride is bad, I could go on and on about people's appeal to authority.

Vaccinations are good. There's no correlation between autism and vaccination. It was a faulty report which was improperly cited by a woman who used her personal emotional feelings, instead of hard and steadfast research when formulating her opinions about the supposed correlation.

Fluoride helps prevent tooth decay, and strengthens the remaining enamel by preventing acidic build-up caused by bacteria mixing with sugars. Fluoride can be dangerous if misused, but the drinking warer flouride is completely safe, and effective. There's no danger.

Never put your stock in an emotional movement. They come with a plethora of biases.

If you had looked at my signature, you could have spared yourself the copy and paste of your list of demonic entities.
There's plenty of evidence for what I believe, unfortunately even if I tried spoon feeding you, you'd likely, well...