Intelligent Design

Dades

solas wrote:

is my favourite movie. friend bought me the book and dvd for christmas, but havent got into the book yet.
I always considered this pretty much right there when it comes to "gods signature".

The movie is great - though changed somewhat from the book.

I delayed reading the book for ages having seen the movie plenty of times - but finally read it last year and cannot recommend it enough. Get into it!

solas

sagan was a bit of a junkie in his younger days, no doubt he's had plenty of "wormhole" experiences

legspin

The Atheist wrote:

Are you saying you have more respect for creationists because they refuse to play the metaphor card?

Ummmmm:o

But no, for that shower of lunatics I have nothing but contempt, but a least you know where they stand.

The metaphorists (?) are almost more infuriating because wooly thinking is much harder to counter

Asiaprod

Zillah wrote:

Yes, it does. The bible spoke of God's creation of earth and the life on it. If there is life elsewhere it ruins the bibles earthocentric outlook. If there is no life elsewhere it supports that outlook.

No it does not. It is not that simple. For that response to be appropriate one would need to be a believer in the bible and have faith in the Judeo-Christian God. This board is an Atheist/Agnostic forum and the bible and God are both subjects of dispute here. The bible is not usually held to be the final word on anything. If a person has absolutely no belief in the bible, or considers it to be a book of myths, half truths, speculation or wishful thinking, despite holding some great wisdom, then how does finding extraterrestrial life support or deny the bible? For the purpose of this discussion, you can neither support nor deny a myth. If we did find life out there, it would be all to easy to say that our earthly edition of the bible did not talk about other life forms since it was aimed at a far less advanced civilization that had not even mastered the rudiments of flight. I see this in much the same way as you mentioned the futility of calling your dog using radio communications.

Besides, although my knowledge of the contents of the bible is limited, I am not aware that it was ever written that life is only known to have taken place on this earth. I think it left the door wide open; did the bible not talk about Ezekiel's space ship? So as you can see, it’s already written in, and before anyone says it, no this does not in IMHO support the validity of the bible. It is all too easy to twist existing vague texts to support new concepts. All that would happen if we found extraterrestrial life is that events in the bible would be expanded upon by some brilliant new theologian to encompass this new revelation and we would have an infallible announcement on the issued. End of problem, since it would once again be a matter of faith--back on the Mobius strip again).

I am going to stick with Occam's razor on this one in that we can explain everything without assuming the extra metaphysical baggage of a Divine Being. However, having said that, if that new life form also had their version of a bible, then I would have to seriously reconsider my position, which would then probably lean more towards ID. Till then, I will keep religion out of science where it only acts to confuse, dictate or flavor opinions.

Zillah

Ok, im not sure how to respond to that...

For that response to be appropriate one would need to be a believer in the bible and have faith in the Judeo-Christian God.

No. The point stands regardless of your point of view. "Facts that support an earthocentric outlook of the universe support fundamentalist christian teachings."

it would be all to easy to say that our earthly edition of the bible did not talk about other life forms since it was aimed at a far less advanced civilization

Completely intolerable to fundamentalist christians. They won't accept that the world might not have literally been made in six days, but you think that that is likely?

Asiaprod

Zillah wrote:

Ok, im not sure how to respond to that...

Completely intolerable to fundamentalist christians. They won't accept that the world might not have literally been made in six days, but you think that that is likely?

Thanks for the reply Zillah, I am a little confused by the question. Could you expand on it and then I can answer.

Zillah

We've gotten kind of tangled up.

I made the point that I would summarise thusly: "Facts that support an earthocentric outlook of the universe support fundamentalist christian teachings."

You seemed to disagree with this, saying "It most certainly does not. All it tells us is how unique our planet is, and how lucky we are to be here having this conversation."

...and your reasoning seemed to be:

"If we did find life out there, it would be all to easy to say that our earthly edition of the bible did not talk about other life forms since it was aimed at a far less advanced civilization"

I disagreed, saying that fundamentalist Christians believe that the world was made in six days, and that we are all descended from two people and similar beliefs, so I find it highly unlikely that they would use such reasoning as you stated above.

You also seemed to mistakenly assume that I meant that would mean the bible was ultimately correct.


But really, I don't think we're really disagreeing with each other here, I think our points of view kinda shot right passed each other.

Asiaprod

Zillah wrote:

We've gotten kind of tangled up.
But really, I don't think we're really disagreeing with each other here, I think our points of view kinda shot right passed each other.

Aha, glad we sorted that out. That was fun. Thanks for your point of view:)

toiletduck

just a theory?

Zombrex

toiletduck wrote:

just a theory?

lol .. saw that before Christmas, was laughing out loud in work .. damn Onion

Asiaprod

toiletduck wrote:

just a theory?

Hahaha, that was very cool. I love that expression, I am going to use it a lot
"a theory in crisis"

Zillah

Although the vast majority of people reading will already know this, I feel its important to note that The Onion is a mock newspaper.

That is all. Please return to laughing.

Zombrex

Zillah wrote:

Although the vast majority of people reading will already know this, I feel its important to note that The Onion is a mock newspaper.

That is all. Please return to laughing.

:v:

robindch

> just a theory?

I wonder if any creationists looked at that and had a giggle? Or looked at the Flying Spaghetti Monster (http://www.venganza.org/) and had a good belly laugh?

I'm asking coz, early last year, I sat through the Life of Brian with a religious zealot and this person laughed in all the right places -- even that hilarious bit with "The Way of the Gourd; No! The Way of the Sandal! Heretic! [slap]". At the end of it, the person was simply unable to apply the satire of what they'd seen to the reality of what they were involved with. Going on from that, I wondered if religious people in general were simply just bad at abstraction, or relating one situation to another?

pfff... any thoughts?

Tar.Aldarion

Zillah wrote:

Although the vast majority of people reading will already know this, I feel its important to note that The Onion is a mock newspaper.

That is all. Please return to laughing.

Ah I see, I was telling myself that that had to be a pisstake, it had to be!
very good

Zillah

Well, the difference between "The life of Brian"/Christianity and IntelligentFalling/Intelligent Design is that the later was quite clearly written in a mocking and disparaging tone.

The Life of Brian has a lot of blasphemy and lack of respect, but few would claim that it was an attempt at making a mockery of Christianty. Intelligent Falling however could be seen as an obvious attack on Intelligent Design.

(Wow, that was very awkward to write...)

Of course its very much a matter of opinion, but I see the Intelligent Falling piece as being a degree more insulting.

the real ramon

Zillah wrote:

Of course its very much a matter of opinion, but I see the Intelligent Falling piece as being a degree more insulting.

Yeah, it bordered on the contemptuous, whereas 'Life of Brian' was just satire. Still, I did have quite a chuckle to meself reading the piece. The Onion is just brilliant, the humour is just 'straight-faced' enough to make the pieces seem believable as real stories. Deadly!

ronbyrne2005

horizon bbc2 thursday 9pm -intelligent design etc.

Dades

ronbyrne2005 wrote:

horizon bbc2 thursday 9pm -intelligent design etc.

Looks interesting.

I'll be kicking some shins in soccer Thursday night, so unless I finally get the VCR/NTL cable mess fixed I'll miss it.

Lot's of religious stuff in the media these days. On Newstalk there was a discussion over the w/e re the impact of Christianity in the US. I think it was The Wide Angle with Karen Coleman, which you might be able to get as a podcast.