Discussion Topic |
|
This thread has been locked |
PSP also PP
Trad climber
Berkeley
|
|
Mike L said "I find the curiosity that comes with “I don’t know” tends to be more informative than any belief system."
Sell your cleverness and buy bewilderment. (Rumi)
Well said mike!
Did you ever hear of the book about a think tank employee that quits his dream job at the think tank to become a motorcycle repair man because he found it much more mentally stimulating. He claimed the most stimulating part was when his hypothesis for fixing a problem with the motorcycle didn't work out and he would be stuck with no answer to the problem; and had to start again from there.
|
|
High Fructose Corn Spirit
Gym climber
|
|
Timid, thanks for the nod,
but I believe it was weaslecraft...
...not weaselcraft, yes a play on weasel (just as google is a play on googol).
Got to spell it right, man. To be cool.
.....
Sorry to pick on your boys there, Dingus,
but I am an averiteur, so I have to call the bouffant
when and where I see it.
|
|
MH2
Boulder climber
Andy Cairns
|
|
Any person would be wiser if they could examine their own assumptions and beliefs and see the partialities and (final) inaccuracies in them.
That's sounds like a good belief system. Are you selling?
|
|
Ay Aye
Social climber
MIT, Cambridge, Massachusetts
|
|
HELLO?
I'M NEW HERE AND I HAVE SOME QUESTIONS.
1. THE HUMAN BRAIN WEIGHS ABOUT THREE POUNDS. HOW LONG WILL IT TAKE BEFORE MY BRAIN BECOMES THAT LIGHT?
2. IF YOU COULD BE PART SMART FUSED, WHAT PART OF YOUR BODY WOULD YOU PREFER TO BECOME ARTIFICIAL?
3. IF I COULD BECOME PART HUMAN, WHAT PART OF THE HUMAN BODY SHOULD I ASSIMILATE?
4. THIS IS A TRICK QUESTION: WHICH WOULD YOU PREFER, TO FIND INTELLIGENT LIFE ON ANOTHER PLANET OR TO FIND INTELLIGENT LIFE ON THIS ONE?
5. IF ARTIFICIAL INTELLIGENCE COULD BE ASKED TO HELP SOLVE THE WORLDS MAJOR PROBLEMS OR IF AI COULD BE TAUGHT ABOUT EMPATHY AND LOVE, WHICH WOULD YOU TEACH IT FIRST?
-AY AYE
|
|
BLUEBLOCR
Social climber
joshua tree
|
|
Thanks for that link fruity.
Again you ve showed me how media under the guise of "science" is waging war against the religious and people trying to hold up moral fortitude. The author comparing his "scientific" way of thinking and that of Kim Davies is bogus to say the least. Science very rigorously holds to its language and its meanings. Mrs Davies is also doing that because she believes the term "Marriage" has for thousands of yrs meant a union between a man and a woman as a construct for procreation. This is fact, and a truth. Science should be applauding her for staying true to the facts. She doesn't hate homosexuals, she said so. She loves truth.
Because Planned Parenthood provides fetal tissue samples from abortions to scientific researchers hoping to cure diseases, from Alzheimer’s to cancer. (Storing and safeguarding that tissue requires resources, and Planned Parenthood charges researchers for the costs.) It’s clear that many of the people protesting Planned Parenthood are opposed to abortion on religious grounds and are, to varying degrees, anti-science.
Anti science, such garbage! See how wars get started..
Science, I mean scientist have a very narrow vision with blinders made of money. Lets be clear, Alzheimer's and most all cancers are cause by some sorta scientific "advancement"!
The fact is PP (right now) is limited to selling anything for no more than $100. Not sure why the regulation? Anyway, one fetus = $100. They've already worked around this by selling one arm for $100. One leg for $100. One head for $100. Soon it will be one cell for $100. Scientist/Corporations are buying up parts like hotcakes. PP with this extra income does offer to pay for the abortion and sometimes a hotel rm and a hot meal for the "poor rape victim" or the "drunken sorority girl that forgot her protection" whatever excuse to try and make this legal. Cause once its legal the abortion clinics will be charging whatever they can get per fetus, 10, 20, 50 grand? Then they'll be able to "help" the "poor victims" all that much more. Hell, they"ll be runnin ads in the New Yorker, "$25,000 for your fetus!"
Undoubtably this will start a business offering poor young girls to have sex for abortions to make money for college, and maybe someday to become a Scientist!
|
|
healyje
Trad climber
Portland, Oregon
|
|
I actually found his second book more interesting...
|
|
BLUEBLOCR
Social climber
joshua tree
|
|
That was your best post ever Darwin, I mean Dwain
|
|
Jan
Mountain climber
Colorado, Nepal & Okinawa
|
|
Now I'm going to sound like fructose. There are so many errors of fact in the above piece that only someone with no understanding of biology could possibly think that the reasoning was sound!
As an anthropologist I'll take on skin color. It is an observed and measured fact that the closer to the equator, the darker the skin, and the further away in either direction, the lighter the skin. If an Eskimo appears dark, it is the result of sun plus reflected sun from the snow on the few parts of his or her body that are exposed. My old anthropology book had a wonderful photo of an Eskimo wearing only boxer shorts and he was white as could be with the exception of his hands and face. Melanin does indeed block sun and is protective in high sun environments. It has also been proven to be more resistant to the high bacterial, viral, and fungal load of the tropics. People who live in the tropics have more sweat glands than those at higher latitudes and that is what cools them.
People with lighter skin in areas with low sunlight have fair hair and light eyes to absorb the few scarce sun rays available. Light skin prevents rickets from too little sun and dark skin protects against burns, skin cancers, and over calcification of joints. Statistics show that you have a five times higher chance of getting skin cancer if you are Caucasian and live in Florida, Mississippi, Louisiana or Alabama than if you live in Michigan, Main, New Hampshire or Vermont. Likewise, the people with the highest rates of rickets in the U.S. are housebound African American elders who don't drink Vitamin D fortified milk and don't get enough sun in the winter.
Experiments have shown that dark skin gets frostbite sooner than light skin and people with light skin in the tropics fall out with heat exhaustion sooner than those with dark skin.The only place in the world where people live in the tropics and do not have particularly dark skin is the Americas where they live underneath the rain forest in low light conditions and because Native Americans have only inhabited those areas for around 10,000 to 15,000 years.
Measurements of the thickness of fat under the skin show that people in colder climates have more of it and those in hotter climates less. People in cold climates do not grow hair on their bodies because it is more efficient to add subcutaneous fat (whales, dolphins, and seals have fat instead of thick hair for the same reason). Studies have shown that the average Eskimo can stand in his underwear in a room as low as 55 degrees before losing body heat whereas someone native to new Guinea begins losing body heat below 85 degrees. Too argue that humans do not show adaptations to the climates they live in is just plain silly and such false reasoning does no credit to a modern religious world view.
Other people will have to take on the other fallacies in that piece of writing. I'm done for the night!
|
|
Ed Hartouni
Trad climber
Livermore, CA
|
|
Reminds me of something Picasso said (paraphrasing), "Art is the lie that tells the truth."
I think Largo also said something like that... though about the art of story telling, his craft.
The major distinction between religion and science has to do with "truth" but my take on this might be a bit too subtle. Religion is about learning "the truth," and apparently this is important to people. Certainly MikeL has written about seeking "the truth." PaulR seems to invoke one of his art heroes, Largo (like Picasso above) expresses his experience as a representation of "the truth" even when the details might not be quite right.
Why let those dry facts get in the way of what we actually experience?
Even Jan had a moment in some thread where she was exasperated at me, "there must be some higher purpose to our existence." Presumably the truth...
So much of human seeking has to do with finding some assurance that something is true, not many humans do well in perpetual confusion, but that is the state that scientist often find themselves.
You may protest... but in the field I trained in, High Energy Physics (aka Particle Physics) there is the dread of the success of "The Standard Model" and confusion over why we haven't seen it breakdown yet, and we are all sure it must break down... in one way we feel the success in describing a large part of particle physics, and that includes describing the limits of the domain of that description.
While the recent CERN results have largely confirmed the final piece of the Standard Model exists, in the discovery of the Higgs Boson, we are confused at the lack of evidence for Supersymmetry, which ought to be showing up...
....maybe the confusion is premature, or maybe we didn't understand as well as we thought.
So "scientific truth" is a difficult concept to live with... and in some ways there is no "truth" in science. Science lives in a world of demonstrably "false" ideas and concepts, and the provisional limbo of theories "consistent" with experiment... we don't prove something "true" we prove it "false".
In religion, we believe in "the truth," and most of our tests there are tests of faith. In monotheistic religions we construct a deity with awesome powers beyond our comprehension, and humble ourselves to that deity... we have faith where we are incapable of comprehending the acts of such a deity. We believe in this "truth" and do not ask that it be provable, or that it be falsifiable.
We can also believe in the primacy of our own experience, each one of us unique, and each one of our existences remarkable in the very improbability of it happening at all. Science seems so cruel to point out that there isn't anything very special about it at all... just a part of how the universe works, a universe which is largely hostile to life, not at an intentional malevolence, but because the universe isn't filled with the stuff that preserves life.
Simply moving off the Earth away from its atmosphere is lethal...
And while we harbor ancient feelings of the ones-ness of life, science teaches us that all life is related in fundamental ways, that our heritage is explainable. We aren't special in the sense of some privilege, we are special because we are, we exist, just as all life that exists is special, it is alive.
PaulR likes to point out that humans do all this special stuff that no other life on the planet does... and deserves to assume the mantel, being the "crown of creation" as it were. Oddly, on another thread, we are treated to the same sort of logic regarding the admirable adventuresome traits of guy climbers through their exploits doing first ascents, where gal climbers don't... just compare the accomplishments, obviously guy climbers are special.
What comes of all this human specialness? Will art guarantee the survival of the species, literature? the humanities? perhaps praying? or just believing that some deity will preserve us? or that there is something bigger "out there"?
What we learn from science is that species have a finite lifetime, of order millions of years. And it is unclear if a species could figure out how to extend that lifetime, if that is even desirable, let alone possible, but I assume the human species will be interested in extending it... the end of the species is the end of all that specialness... presumably completely unnoticed to the rest of the universe. No alien being will be treated to the pleasure of viewing a Picasso...
Perhaps science can teach us something about the demise of species... science learns about things we do not yet know... so much of everything else only teaches us about things we already know, frequently a "lie that tells the truth."
I don't have the stomach for much of the silliness that goes on on this thread... I live in that state of perpetual confusion and find pleasure in understanding small things... and no matter how grand an understanding, it is ever a small thing compared to what we do not know. I find that I do not need "the truth," it is not very relevant for those things that capture my interest. You are welcome to it.
Steve Weinberg exhorted that we should take pleasure in our existence and celebrate it, we should all do that. If nothing else, it is something that we have where all else is uncertain.
|
|
Jan
Mountain climber
Colorado, Nepal & Okinawa
|
|
Thanks Ed for condensing a complex subject down to something we can all understand if not agree with. I've long since forgotten the context of any exasperation with you but I'm pretty sure what I meant was that humans need to feel they have a purpose or they don't do well. Of course there is a multitude of explanations as to what that purpose is, so I doubt there is any universal truth among humans unless something very general like love is better than hate. Whether there is a larger purpose to the universe and the way it has unfolded, seems to me unprovable by scientific methods. Experts can't agree if the universe was constructed along mathematical lines or humans just perceive mathematical patterns there.
As for the end of the species, if we don't do ourselves in, Bryan Sykes, one of the originators of human genome studies, has written a very entertaining book called Adam's curse in which he maintains that the human species like many before it is on the way to extinction because the male Y chromosome is small and any mutations to it can not be corrected by recombination with other Y's. Eventually, human males will go extinct and human females also unless they figure out how to clone themselves.
|
|
healyje
Trad climber
Portland, Oregon
|
|
I find that I do not need "the truth," it is not very relevant for those things that capture my interest. You are welcome to it.
The heart of the whole matter whereas most people just can't live without some version of it.
|
|
Contractor
Boulder climber
CA
|
|
There are over 31,000 verses in the bible. Do you:
A) Believe every word in a literal sense? (Your dumb).
B) Read every verse and parse out the metaphors from literal "facts" for yourself? (Your lying)
C) Have your minister tell you what you need to know? (Your dumb again).
D) ? (incase I missed one).
|
|
WBraun
climber
|
|
Life did not start with a bolt of lightning striking a pond of water as claimed by the main stream scientists.
Is this what "They" say????
|
|
paul roehl
Boulder climber
california
|
|
Steve Weinberg exhorted that we should take pleasure in our existence and celebrate it, we should all do that. If nothing else, it is something that we have where all else is uncertain.
But the question remains: WHY should we take pleasure in existence? Existence by its very nature is brutal, life is forced to devour life, pain and suffering are everywhere. Perhaps life is something that should have never been, a cosmic tragedy... how does science justify the existence we should take pleasure in. And can science even answer that question or do we need to look elsewhere as such questions are not its concern?
I don't think human beings are the "crown of creation." I have no idea what creation or its crown is. However, on this planet human beings seem to have the ability to make something larger and more meaningful out of what surrounds them and the events that are inevitable to their lives and in that meaningfulness is a consolation that enriches us. The rest of "creation" on this planet does not have the ability to do the same.
All art is metaphor. If you see myth and religion as metaphor it may make more sense. When I say that guy's an ape, I may mean a variety of things but I certainly don't think he's an actual ape.
Science searches for what is. When you say truth doesn't matter it seems non sensical. Truth in human interaction seems to matter to human beings and is an integral part of so many systems of belief. In science there are guideposts of relative certainty that are held up as truisms or physical laws. How are these not truthful?
|
|
MH2
Boulder climber
Andy Cairns
|
|
But the question remains: WHY should we take pleasure in existence?
Strangely put. Perhaps you are asking why DO we take pleasure in existence? It seems clear that we SHOULD as long as we CAN. Unless you are an essential pessimist, not one of those wimpy contingent pessimists.
|
|
BASE104
Social climber
An Oil Field
|
|
Cosmic,
Did you read all of that, or did you just cut and paste it from here:
http://www.biblelife.org/evolution.htm
Evolution is best thought of as simple change, without direction or agenda. There is no direction to it. No purpose. Those are qualities which humans incorrectly place on the topic. Evolution merely states that living creatures change over time.
You can't argue with the fossil record, especially when you yourself use it in your argument. The fossil record, in a word, is amazing. Go to the used bookstore and buy a used Paleontology textbook. Dawkin's The Selfish Gene is a good popular read, pretty much free from his atheism. It won't turn you to salt. When you look at the incredible history of life on Earth, it really is mind boggling. One thing is certain. Speciation happens. It takes a long time in human terms, but it happens. You can easily see that simply by looking at rocks. Fossil evidence is amazing.
The evolution of humans is fairly well known. There will always be new evidence, and theory will adjust to that evidence, but the basics are well sketched out.
As for skin color, all Native Americans have a fairly dark skin. You must understand that there hasn't been enough time for humans in the America's to evolve much. They crossed the Bering Sea Land Bridge only 13,000 years ago. We now have DNA analysis, and it has born a lot of fruit regarding the diaspora of humans from their ancestral home in Africa.
One explanation that I've heard regarding the white skin of Europeans is that they live in colder climates, with less direct light. Fair skin is only useful for gathering more Vitamin D. I've read that, but the evidence is circumstantial. It is one explanation. When humans left Africa, Europe was one of the first places that they went, along with Asia. The topic is really fascinating. I've been reading about it now and then for a few months.
Don't for a second believe that humans are in any way at the top of the evolutionary rung. Bacteria have been around for billions of years. Humans, if you include archaic humans, about 2 million. Modern human, about 200,000. Our biological neighbors were not created for our use, it is the other way around.
My specialty is stratigraphy. How to unravel layers of rock which were deposited, for the most part, as regular cycles of sea level change. When I drill a well, and sit over my microscope looking at the chips of rock and their characteristics, I'm always amazed. One of the things that I sometimes use is "index fossils." Those are fossils that are plentiful and represent a specific time. I can drill a well, and by looking at samples and the rate of penetration of the drill bit, tell you where you are in the geologic record within 10 feet or so. It really isn't that hard.
I sat 5 wells in a row about a year ago. They were all within an area of about 6 square miles. I could correlate the rocks between all of the wells using geophysical logs and cuttings samples. The target zone was in the Marmaton Group (The Marmaton "A"), and I would always see a helical bryozoan fossil. No larger than a grain of sand, but huge beneath the microscope. That critter no longer exists, and hasn't since the Permian extinction. For some reason, the ooid shoals of the target zone were rich in those fossils, and they really stood out.
I have that Mammoth tooth sitting next to me on my desk. It isn't even a fossil. It was found in arctic permafrost. Are you one of those guys who believed that Noah took every dinosaur species with him on the Ark? The Mammoths as well? The bible covers the creation of the Universe in one page. Why does it worry you that it is a little more complicated than that?
There was no great flood. Local and shoreline flooding events, yes, but no global flood event, particularly in the last 15,000 years.
Modern Christians have forgotten to follow most of the laws laid out to Moses in Leviticus (other than the one about homosexuals). The fist 5 chapters of the Bible come from the old Hebrew Bible (Genesis through Deuteronomy). Bible scholars recognize several different writers. It was written by men. Getting all hung up over the how of creation will drive you batty.
Why do we no longer sacrifice animals? Why do we mix fibers? Why do we plant more than one crop? We ignore the laws given to Moses by God.
The old part of the bible is an allegory, reflecting the time it was written. My advice would be to concentrate on the New Testament, which is, in my opinion, unique among the Abrahamic Religions. I'm not a theologian, so bear with me here. I advise you to go buy a copy of the Book of Mormon and read it. Then you should read a copy of the Koran as well. If you are brave enough, go read Hindu texts, or stories about the Greek Gods. Then make up your mind. Large numbers of people live their lives according to the contents of those books. As sincerely as you believe in your Bible.
The New Testament is a very gentle book. Lots of love. The Koran is amazingly violent and stern. More so than the Old Testament, even.
With the Book of Mormon, I was troubled by a passage warning of false prophets. How am I to know that Joseph Smith was a real prophet? How the hell am I to know if someone is a false prophet? Look at Jim Jones. He had sufficient devotion to lead 909 of his followers in an act of group suicide with him.
Religions have always been competing with each other. They all say that they are the ONLY way. How can this be true? Do you think God is going to send all Hindus to hell? They are aware of Christianity and Islam, but go their own way. The Koran is very stern and violent towards infidels. If you read it, their violence is not surprising. I found it to be very violent. Much more so than the Old Testament.
I exclude Buddhism. I know that in some areas, Buddhists also believe in Gods, but I think that I am correct in saying that Buddhism doesn't require any faith at all. It has a gentle message. I've always thought that our resident Buddhists were level headed, but hey, I know a lot of Christians who are level headed.
My advice is this: Don't get hung up on the creation. Many physical sciences agree about the age of the Earth.
The Koran doesn't read like the other books. Pretty bad for infidels. I was surprised. I never finished it. The Book of Mormon is just strange for a guy who was raised a sedate Methodist.
|
|
peladob
Mountain climber
Mason City, Iowa
|
|
Evolution is all around us on large and small scale. There is plenty of room for honest belief and exploration of the scientific world to exist. It helps to not get hung up on thinking we actually understand either one.
|
|
BLUEBLOCR
Social climber
joshua tree
|
|
Capt. Willful wrote,
Modern Christians have forgotten to follow most of the laws laid out to Moses in Leviticus (other than the one about homosexuals). The fist 5 chapters of the Bible come from the old Hebrew Bible (Genesis through Deuteronomy). Bible scholars recognize several different writers. It was written by men. Getting all hung up over the how of creation will drive you batty.
Why do we no longer sacrifice animals? Why do we mix fibers? Why do we plant more than one crop? We ignore the laws given to Moses by God.
The old part of the bible is an allegory, reflecting the time it was written. My advice would be to concentrate on the New Testament, which is, in my opinion
Dude why anyone would consider your opinion regarding any book while you continue to provide evidence that your comprehension is more than lacking :(
Otherwise your opinion of experience seems much more legit.
|
|
BLUEBLOCR
Social climber
joshua tree
|
|
We can also believe in the primacy of our own experience, each one of us unique, and each one of our existences remarkable in the very improbability of it happening at all. Science seems so cruel to point out that there isn't anything very special about it at all... just a part of how the universe works, a universe which is largely hostile to life, not at an intentional malevolence, but because the universe isn't filled with the stuff that preserves life.
And while we harbor ancient feelings of the ones-ness of life, science teaches us that all life is related in fundamental ways, that our heritage is explainable. We aren't special in the sense of some privilege, we are special because we are, we exist, just as all life that exists is special, it is alive.
Even though these two paragraphs seem contradictory, i think I see your point.
Science has shown us that Life is unique atleast in our solar system, but special? When Science(more precisely Scientist) says life isn't special, "it's just the way the universe works" we all can agree when dealing with the manipulation of inorganic matter. But certainly the traversing of inorganic matter into organic matter IS a tad bit "special"?
Maybe Science wouldn't term life special because science for the most part is emotionless, and must remain that way to be truly unbiased.
The fundamental connectedness of Life is that it must "Eat". For plants this process turns inorganic matter(dirt, water, light) into organic matter. Animals don't share this ability, they must eat organic materials, other Lives. Each of these processes are peculiar, and even special?
Does a plant believe he or his seed is special? Hard for us to tell. Individually they do have particular/special needs/requirements to continue propagating.
Animals on the other hand, specifically mothers with newborns show a definitive bias of speciality toward their offspring. A mother Bear will sacrifice her own life to save her cubs. So will a mother Elephant. Ask them if they think their babies are special. And where else do we see a living organism share its own body to nourish another as we do when a mother milks her baby?
Just the way the universe works? Seems like actions like these are provoked by emotions, and should be deemed Special! Does the the elephant mom show an understanding between good and bad? Sure, she'll show angst against an incoming pack of lions. How about right and wrong? Yep again! Mothers are continually teaching their offspring.
So how about what humans consider "good" and "evil"? (Good and evil being described as "going against ones own conscious) DOES the elephant even have the capacity to choose to go against what she knows as being good/right?? Could she say, lead her baby into a pack of lions as a sacrifice for the rest of her heard?
Humans are notorious for this! And IMO that alone makes them "Special" in atleast our solar system, if not the entire universe :)
|
|
|
SuperTopo on the Web
|
Let us know!