General Chat

has declared that his latest work shows there was no creator of the universe.

Heh.

Stephen Hawking.
Richard Dawkins.

Stephen Hawkins, Richard Dawking? ;)


http://answers.yahoo.com/question/index?qid=20100902130041AARJ0nu

"Richard Dawkins and Stephen Hawking have the same last name except the 1st and last letters. Coincidence?"


They're both smart guys. Hopefully, somebody will listen to them.

I'm going to go watch them talk to each other:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CMJFfaKZXRs

At last,


the truth is out there.....}}}}}}}

That's fair enough if that's what they think but I'm not sure I really believe in science.

No one is infallible ;)

when it comes down to it those who believe in God if proved right will have the chance to say "I told you so"...

those who don't believe, if proved right will NEVER have the chance to say "I told you so" :))

CarolB, if you google stephen hawking richard dawkins, there are all sorts of links to the video of the conversation (I only listened with half an ear then, will have to try again).

I have the opposite problem it seems -- I can't view BBC videos because they're blocked to me in Canada!

RR -- if those of us who don't believe are right, a lot of people will have wasted their lives living for what never came. ;)

mmm very interesting, what i think he is saying that they now have proof than all things in the universe follow laws of nature, he also said but who made them laws? so he as not said their is no God, just that the universe was not created.

I think the point is: why would anyone think that something created anything?

The "laws" are the way things work, like the law of gravity.

They aren't like "everyone who commits murder shall be sentenced to imprisonment for life ...".

They don't tell things how to behave. They describe how things behave.

Why is it more fantastical to think that things just *are* than to think that something created them?

If you think something created things, don't you have to ask what created the something that created everything else?

So believing that a god just *is*, and doesn't exist because something else created it, isn't much different from believing that things just are, if you ask me.

Except, of course, that I *know* that things exist, and nobody knows that a god exists. ;)

And certainly I don't think that any of the things that exist in the universe take a personal interest in me, or in any of the billions of other things like me that have existed and will exist, or in any of all the other things in the universe. Or want to punish or reward me for what I do, in some other magical life in some other magical place. I do find that just silly.

Everything in the universe just is, and I just am. If anything else exists, I wouldn't and couldn't possibly know.

That's why, being rational, I am an
agnostic (don't know)
atheist (don't believe)
and if I knew the Latin word for "don't care", I'd add that too. ;)

Hee hee.

The Latin verb for "care" is curare. (From which we get curator, etc.) A "care" is curo.

I am care-free, when it comes to gods! Untroubled, unconcerned, unworried.

So I'd say I'm an insouciant agnostic atheist. ;)

Janey, Only wasted if people think that it 'doesn't matter' what you do here or that what you make of this life is irrelevant because " it's the after life that matters" or is your 'reward for going to church every Sunday' ;)

If I'm right and there IS a God / afterlife then what I do here really counts, both in terms of making the most of the 'God given gift' and for the sake of my 'immortal soul' ( that last still needs some work !)

If I'm wrong and there isn't anything after then every minute of this life really counts.....

win/win...or lose/lose...depending on how you see it :)

Guess it all depends on what one thinks one's god wants of one.

If one's god has volumes of rules that are to be followed, and one follows them to the letter, there are a lot of really fine and interesting things in real life that one might miss out on for no reason at all. That's one's choice, of course.

If one thinks that one's god looks only at the big picture and doesn't really care if one happens to have inhaled a few interesting substances or not bothered getting official blessings for one's romantic adventures, or generally handled one's affairs as one pleased without harming others, why bother? One is really just making up one's own rules anyway, so ascribing them to a god is just a bit of intellectual cowardice, isn't it?

On the other hand, if one thinks that one's god wants one to convert the unbelievers and punish people who don't follow one's god's rules ... well, that goes beyond belief, and it does become seriously problematic for other people, whether it wins eternal life or not.

I think as we move more into the world of Quantum mechanics the more confused we will all get, particles do not act in the same way as common sense says thing should act, funny things are these particles they are opening up a whole new set of laws.

Questions that has no logic answer is,


God created heaven and earth and all that went and goes with it,,,,,,,Adam and Eve,the only living humans they had 2 sons,,,,,,where did the women come from for the sons-----incest?
and how did he know to make one a woman and call it a woman and one a man?

and who on earth created God?
where did he arrive from,did he drop out the sky as a first humam with all the thinking cells and makeup as we have now ?

so a god didnt for me really exsist and still doesnt.

Well, God does exist for me but I don't suppose anyone is really interested.


I don't 'do' intense philosophical arguments into the why's and wherefore's of the formation of the universe nor do I argue the case for and against Darwinism - those arguments have been around for so long and can, and do, go on .....for ever!


I am not prepared to have intense mega cyber discussions about the faith but am willing to sit alongside someone and share my experiences, to state my case and to listen to their questions, their hopes and their fears.


I know that having a faith is right for me but am aware that others are not prepared to go that way, but I won't fall out with them about it.


I have been willing to listen and learn from those more experienced than me and then to weigh up what I have heard.


I have been prepared to open my heart and mind to things which I found uncomfortable and disturbing.


I can only say that without a faith I would have nothing. Life would be empty and meaningless; I would be drifting along, hopeless, aimless and rootless and....probably bored!


I am a human being and, like most others, have my moments of fear and doubt, l but I also have deep feelings of hope, of joy, of fulfilment, of awareness, of contentment, of peace and of that 'something' which passes all understanding.


I simply have a Christian faith that comes from deep within me and which keeps me going and I thank God for it.


:)) Cx

Cynthia, I don't have as strong a faith as you appear to have but I admire your post and feel similarly.

I would never criticise anyone for not believing in the God that I do and I don't understand why anyone would try to belittle or attack what I believe.

That's all very well, Cynthia. ;)

There's just little point in saying it in public.

I may as well say there are faeries at the bottom of the garden and I know because I have spoken to them and it gives me great comfort that they are watching over my veg garden. It makes as much sense and it has as much meaning to anyone else. At least, anyone who hasn't got faeries at the bottom of their garden too.

There are lots of things that pass understanding. Quantum physics passes mine, at least it does now. If I bothered to investigate it, it might not, at least not totally. The fact that I don't understand something doesn't mean either that it is real or that it isn't real.

I'm not at all interested in discussions about "the faith". ;) Not yours in a god, not mine in my faeries.

Discussions about the workings of the universe, at least those aspects that we're able to fathom, are worth having in the same way that discussions about anything else real are worth having.

But to say that a "Christian faith" comes from deep within someone ... that just makes no sense. Would it have arrived by osmosis if there were no written texts and no churches to promulgate them? ;)

There's very little point to most of the stuff that gets posted on here, Janey. How much point there is isn't why we post or read and it's uncharitable of you to be so dismissive.

Janey to answer your last question ,

"But to say that a "Christian faith" comes from deep within someone ... that just makes no sense. Would it have arrived by osmosis if there were no written texts and no churches to promulgate them? ;)"

It wouldn't have been a 'Christian ' faith without being told about, or reading texts about Christ. ...but it would still have been a faith.

Arrived by osmosis? well yes really because i think I would have faith in a 'higher being' ( call it what one will ) even had no one ever told me there might be one, you can argue that is Man just making a God in his own image or trying to find an explanation for things they can't understand ...or you could say it was an instinctive 'recognition' ...that for some is there and for others isn't...like the faeries ( or fairies) at the bottom of your garden ;)

I don't understand quantum physics...I might if I tried, I do have a little grasp of the Big Bang (is that still a THEORY btw?) , just as I have a little knowledge of Darwinism,and evolution...but none of those is incompatible with my 'faith' :))

I await the hour of my demise ( not just yet I hope) when I shall know for sure that as per usual I was 'right' ;)

Why isn't there any point in saying it in public Janey? Everyone else is saying what they do or don't believe.


Hmmm....how can I explain the Christian faith within me bit? Well of course, the written and spoken word have had their effect on me and I have inwardly tried to digest them. Please don't take that literally ';)


My church attendance has given me a certain discipline and a sense of belonging as well as 'feeding me'. Have had some brilliant fun and friendships too.


I can't remember everything I have learnt but, as I can't remember every meal I have ever eaten, I know most of it has done me some good and kept me 'nourished'.


Umm .. ..okay.....how do you explain your love of jazz music? (I think it's jazz you like isn't it?)


I assume, (which isn't always a wise thing to do), that it 'touches' something within you....a nerve, a chord.....call it whatever you want.....it isn't a tangible thing, it's
something which generally makes you feel happy or content or......whatever.


Can you describe your love for your OH? Can you describe it? Touch it? Or do we just have to believe that your love for him is something between the two of you, something personal which you share and which is hard to define and express?



HEY!.....that's not fair JC....I don't DO intense cyber faith chats.......now go and find a census to worry about. :)) Cx