Well, there are people who have been clinically dead and came back.
Common reports: Floating above dead body and surrounding environment. Tunnel of light.
Topic: The function of religion ? - page 26. (Read 18646 times)
no religion provides any practical procedure to test its truth.
Well, technically, they all do: die, and see for yourself. Of course, that means anyone wishing to test the validity of a religion is forever removed from the pool of doubters, so any test of the religion automatically increases the perceived validity (measured as a percentage of the population who believe it to be true) of the religion. It's a pretty sweet con, if you ask me.
So to your above statement, I would add: "and prove the results to others."
Education and science has been bastardized, bought and sold many times over.
Science and Math has become the new religion
Unfortunately, I must admit there is some truth in this. I believe in a lot of scientific concepts, and yet I don't understand them all. At some point to believe in science you have to put some faith in scientists.
On the other hand, does that mean that science is nothing but a modern kind of religion? I don't think so. At least with science, you have the theoretical possibility to learn how to understand or experience things you did not understand nor see by yourself.
For instance, I've never seen Jupiter through a telescope. So to me it just looks like a very bright point in the sky (I've watch it several times). But if one day people suddenly start questioning the fact that it looks like what we currently know it looks like (i.e., a huge cloudy planet with a big red storm on the south hemisphere), at least I could buy a telescope and figure it out by myself. That's a big difference: no religion provides any practical procedure to test its truth.
Science and Math has become the new religion, people just switch from one religion to another religion depends on their utility
It depends on what you mean by "function". For humans it serves a spiritual need.
I'm going to make it probably too simplistic, but to me it just fills the gaps of our knowledge and understanding of the World. When something happens and we don't know why, this makes us uneasy. To feel better, we sometimes just say "it happened because someone did it, somehow". "God" is just one of the many words we created to call it.
Not a human mind, no.
I thought you meant that information requires consciousness to exist. Whether this consciousness comes from a human, an inhabitant of the Alpha Centauri system or a God-like being does not matter. Consciousness is consciousness.
Information has quite an accurate scientific definition nowadays. It even has a mathematical formulation. It's one of the basic concepts of thermodynamics, which means that it is used to analyze matter on molecular level and thereby define notions such as temperature. And I assure you, to do so physicists do not need to assume that anyone has a full awareness of the exact position and momentum of all existing particles. It even goes beyond than that if you want to talk about quantum mechanics, but this is probably off topic.
Information is only information if there is something to understand it, record it, and recognize it.
That sentence is correct! That 'something' is a supreme creator God.
Information cannot exist without being created first.
We create information. Are we supreme creator Gods because of it?
But there doesn't need to be someone to create information, either. What I meant was that information is a concept that is meaningless without something to interpret it. Doesn't matter who created it, and without an interpreter, it is just noise. The sun creates photons, which race down to earth, and some of which get blocked by trees to cause shadow. The mess of photons and shadows is just noise. However, someone can interpret that noise to find out what time of day it is. No supreme creator needed for creating that information, or to interpret it. Ditto for earth's magnetic fields and warm/cold climates supposedly interpreted by birds.
If you wish to believe that some divine being is needed for that, feel free to. I don't see any reason or evidence for it.
It depends on what you mean by "function". For humans it serves a spiritual need. This of course can be abused by power structures to further their interests.
Sorry, did you mean that what I wrote is science fiction?
I wonder if you know how close this is from some hard science fiction concepts.
I once had a dream, a dream where us humans were in outer space building a mind. A mind that contained all knowledge and all possibilities. We were building an omnipotent being, a god. Maybe we never came from god, we came to build god. We may just as well succeed . Succeed in making our own god.
I wonder if you know how close this is from some hard science fiction concepts.
As for the function of religion....
We as humans choose to believe in what we believe for one reason or another. We may believe that our beliefs are based on cold hard facts and we may even find others who believe in what we believe. And even though 99% of people may be on our side, we can always give the 1% the benefit of the doubt and respect their beliefs and choices. Because we as humans know very well that if we were to be 100% about everything then we would have nothing.
Im grateful and thankful to everyone for sharing and believing.
Pls keep it friendly
We as humans choose to believe in what we believe for one reason or another. We may believe that our beliefs are based on cold hard facts and we may even find others who believe in what we believe. And even though 99% of people may be on our side, we can always give the 1% the benefit of the doubt and respect their beliefs and choices. Because we as humans know very well that if we were to be 100% about everything then we would have nothing.
Im grateful and thankful to everyone for sharing and believing.
Pls keep it friendly
Information does not need a conscious mind to exist, yet I understand this is a tricky philosophical question.
Not a human mind, no.
The tree falling in the forest is indeed a tricky philosophical question. A logical contradiction, is not a philosophical idea at all. Its a true or false law. Philosophy typically has no bearing to the physical world.
Just try to occupy the same space as someone else, and you'll quickly understand the physical reality of the problem.
I once had a dream, a dream where us humans were in outer space building a mind. A mind that contained all knowledge and all possibilities. We were building an omnipotent being, a god. Maybe we never came from god, we came to build god. We may just as well succeed . Succeed in making our own god.
I wonder if you know how close this is from some hard science fiction concepts.
I once had a dream, a dream where us humans were in outer space building a mind. A mind that contained all knowledge and all possibilities. We were building an omnipotent being, a god. Maybe we never came from god, we came to build god. We may just as well succeed . Succeed in making our own god.
The universe, and our minds, are not chaotic. They are structured, ordered. There is no such thing as chaos in this universe, chaos being the absence of information.
Besides, if what you say is true about the human mind, then how can you argue anything at all? Just give up, its pure chaos in our heads.
Besides, if what you say is true about the human mind, then how can you argue anything at all? Just give up, its pure chaos in our heads.
Information is only information if there is something to understand it, record it, and recognize it.
That sentence is correct! That 'something' is a supreme creator God.
Information cannot exist without being created first.
Since obviously information existed before any physical mind (otherwise we could have actual logical contradictions), the only rational conclusion that can be reached, is that there is an omnipresent, all-powerful, all-knowing God.
Other theories can be formulated, but none of them are rational if they don't make an exception for a supreme being.
Information does not need a conscious mind to exist, though I understand this is a tricky philosophical question.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/If_a_tree_falls_in_a_forest
The universe, and our minds, are not chaotic. They are structured, ordered. There is no such thing as chaos in this universe, chaos being the absence of information.
Besides, if what you say is true about the human mind, then how can you argue anything at all? Just give up, its pure chaos in our heads.
Besides, if what you say is true about the human mind, then how can you argue anything at all? Just give up, its pure chaos in our heads.
Information is only information if there is something to understand it, record it, and recognize it.
That sentence is correct! That 'something' is a supreme creator God.
Information cannot exist without being created first.
Since obviously information existed before any physical mind (otherwise we could have actual logical contradictions), the only rational conclusion that can be reached, is that there is an omnipresent, all-powerful, all-knowing God.
Other theories can be formulated, but none of them are rational if they don't make an exception for a supreme being.
In our small little minds and barely significant existence you being 99% right may mean something to you and everyone else in the world but it does not even mean a grain of dust in all the deserts of the world. It is insignificant to the Universe. And no matter how clever we think we are the Universe will find a way to prove us otherwise. The only word that comes close, if there were such a word to describe this, is the word mystery.
OK, then tell me why? Why does one of my opinions, based on evidence, and corroborated by everyone else in the world, is just as right as your differing opinion, even if it was not based on evidence and only you believed it?
Even if everyone in the world agreed with you it still makes you just as right as I am, no more. You may call me insane or any other word you can conjure up, and I will still have my own opinion.
OK, then tell me why? Why does one of my opinions, based on evidence, and corroborated by everyone else in the world, is just as right as your differing opinion, even if it was not based on evidence and only you believed it?
The universe, and our minds, are not chaotic. They are structured, ordered. There is no such thing as chaos in this universe, chaos being the absence of information.
Besides, if what you say is true about the human mind, then how can you argue anything at all? Just give up, its pure chaos in our heads.
Besides, if what you say is true about the human mind, then how can you argue anything at all? Just give up, its pure chaos in our heads.
Information is only information if there is something to understand it, record it, and recognize it. Using that understanding, the universe is quite chaotic.
Admittedly, though, order and chaos are human concepts. What we see as ordered, such and boxes stacked alphabetically, may seem chaotic to someone with a different language alphabet. Likewise, boxes being placed chaotically all over a warehouse without any seeming order, look perfectly structured to a robot that remembers the location of each box in its database, and placed then based on how much time it would waste placing and retrieving them. So, in that sense, all we can really say is whether the information is stored efficiently based on the time it takes to recall it, and the quality of recalled information. Compared to written words, recorded videos, or data stored on computers, our memory storage is EXTREMELY inefficient.
Though that physical method of memory storage and recall is I guess what gives us a chance to be unique, defining us as who we are with every new neural link and every new neural break. And all we are really doing is trying to use our inefficient brains to make structure and sense out of a chaotic world. Why? Because evolution said that's the best method of survival.
Even if everyone in the world agreed with you it still makes you just as right as I am, no more. You may call me insane or any other word you can conjure up, and I will still have my own opinion.
OK, then tell me why? Why does one of my opinions, based on evidence, and corroborated by everyone else in the world, is just as right as your differing opinion, even if it was not based on evidence and only you believed it?
Religion is ubiquitous and universal in human culture (in some form for hundreds of thousands of years). Anthropologically that suggests it's a pretty significant component of evolved human behavior.
It's only after the enlightenment that we get any notion of the possibility that it's all nonsense.
The question really isn't one of belief - it must be one of evolution. Religion must have provided a substantial evolutionary advantage otherwise it couldn't have existed at all.
You haven't read my quote above of Daniel Dennet comparing religion to the common cold, have you?It's only after the enlightenment that we get any notion of the possibility that it's all nonsense.
The question really isn't one of belief - it must be one of evolution. Religion must have provided a substantial evolutionary advantage otherwise it couldn't have existed at all.
Religion has an evolutionary advantage... for religion. Same as a common cuckoo has an "evolutionary advantage" other a reed warbler:
Parasitism does exist. And it does not give any evolutionary advantage to the host.
You know, slavery also has been common for thousands of years. Does that make it a good thing?
I'm not sure evolution cares about good or bad (you think cookoos are bad?)- a human judgement that parasites are bad is irrelevant (unless it gives you an evolutionary advantage).
Morality and good and evil etc are myths just like religion.
We're all parasites (look at what you had for dinner today)
There were two parts in my post. The first one was to show you that the fact that religion exists does not mean that it gives an evolutionary advantage to humans. It does not anymore than the common cold or diabetes does.
The second one was to alarm you of your reasoning that consists in saying "it has existed for thousands of years, so it must be good".
These were two separate arguments. Please don't mix them.
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