Does God exist?

[Moontanman]

Moon, if you have the answers or a better theory, speak up. What does string theory say about the origin of the universe?

 

Membrane theory suggests what we see as a big bang was actually a collision between two multidimensional membranes that float in a multi dimensional universe composed of a multidimensional space. Our universe would be a membrane inside this multi-verse. When the two membranes collide the big bang happens every where not at some set point. the force of the collision and resulting release of all the energy contained in the two membranes result in the two membranes being pushed apart until their mutual attraction via gravity causes them to come back together. this process repeats into infinity. Think of our universe as sheet hanging over a clothesline. next to another sheet. they come together, not all at once, but as the wrinkles touch all the matter in each sheet is turned into energy. this causes the illusion of a big bang. once the entire sheet is in contact with the other sheet at all point the two are forced apart only to repeat this ever few hundreds of billions of years.

[goku]

Now I could present you with a white piece of candy that I said was vanilla flavored and if you trusted me, you might believe that it was. But when you put it in your mouth and discovered it was actually coconut flavored, would you still believe it tasted like vanilla simply because I said so, and you had trusted me?

 

point taken.

but what if i had never tasted vanillia?

what if you were not there when life was created, or began?

[questor]

Moon, what is the composition of the membranes? I assume there is mass if we are in the membrane. When the membranes strike each other, how is the energy released? Is it from the collision of Dark matter, or massive bodies in the membrane? If it is from massive bodies such as planets and stars, we are goners on the next collision. How do the membranes maintain their integrity?

[Moontanman]

Moon, what is the composition of the membranes? I assume there is mass if we are in the membrane. When the membranes strike each other, how is the energy released? Is it from the collision of Dark matter, or massive bodies in the membrane? If it is from massive bodies such as planets and stars, we are goners on the next collision. How do the membranes maintain their integrity?

 

The Membranes are composed of our four or five or how ever many dimensional universe. From the stand point of a higher dimension our universe would appear as a two dimensional plane appears in our universe. The collision of the membranes is what releases the energy, as they pass through each other all matter is turned into energy. Oh yes we and everything will be gone when the membranes collide. Fortunately this would be a process that takes place over time scales of 1000s of billions of years at least. The membranes are separate universes, gravity pulls them together, energy release pushes them apart. They can be thought of as being too far away to be measured and closer than the width of a proton. Multidimensional space is very difficult to imagine, it is somewhat counter intuitive to say the least. Some theorize that these universes are composed of matter/antimatter pairs and as they contact they annihilate each other. Some think this is not necessary and the act of contact is enough to annihilate them.

[questor]

String theory has not been proved has it? And I would expect that not all mathematical predictions are correct.

[Moontanman]

String theory has not been proved has it? And I would expect that not all mathematical predictions are correct.

 

M-Brane theory is just a mathematical exercise, nothing it predicts that can be tested is inconsistent with BB theory. It attemps shows that what we think of as the universe is really a very small part of a much bigger and complex multi-verse. The energy levels needs to confirm these things is far outside our ability at this time so it really has to be pretty much speculation. Higher dimensions is something I like to wrap my head around, I get a very good feeling by seeing these dimensions in my minds eye. They feel right to me, sounds lame I know but it's the only way I can describe them.

[modest]

Moon, what is the composition of the membranes? I assume there is mass if we are in the membrane. When the membranes strike each other, how is the energy released? Is it from the collision of Dark matter, or massive bodies in the membrane? If it is from massive bodies such as planets and stars, we are goners on the next collision. How do the membranes maintain their integrity?

 

You could also check out 14829in the Astronomy forum. :hihi:

 

~modest

[William Honey]

"PROTECT YOUR ONE BILLION DOLLAR LIFE"!

 

Love yourself enough to protect and save your own life....Yea!

[goku]

Religion can kill you!

 

If a person has been brainwashed to believe that he has a god walking around with him

that is protecting him all day every day, he can think I can save that person from drowning so he jumps in to save the drowning person and drowns himself.

 

How many soldiers in war come out of a foxhole thinking that his god is protecting him

and he can not be killed? Then he comes out with bullets flying all around him. He still

thinks that he is under the protection of his god. Then the bullets hit him and he dies.

 

The people who brainwashed him actually killed the soldier. Had he not been brainwashed, he could have stayed in his foxhole and might have survived.

 

So many people have been brainwashed to believe that their god is right there with them, that they will run into a burning home to save people that they don't even know.

They think, god is with me and I can save these people. They go into the home and

are burned to death. Did his religion kill him ??? When will all this stop? It will not stop

as long as big money is involved and the rich people behind all these religions will keep

pushing the brainwashing to get the huge donations.

 

No way I am going into a burning home or running into the street to save a person I

don't even know. I don't know if God is there or not, so common sense tells me to

look out for myself and protect myself.

 

Too much money in religion and too many big people so nothing will ever change

unless a revelation occurs. It is predicted that a revelation will occur that will change

all this.

 

those soldiers were fighting so you could have the right to be anti-social ;)

 

be carefull what you say, else you may find yourself trapped inside a burning house praying for someone to save you :eek:

[William Honey]

Hello goku and thank you much for your input.

 

I did rewrite the former post, so you might want to read it again, okay.

[LJP07]

You have to question the legitimacy of religion especially Christianity when it comes to the creation story and the Virgin Birth.

 

The creation story has been falsified by science, that much I think any thinking person must agree with. (For example, to create day and night before you create the sun, isn't that a clever design God!?)

 

The Virgin Birth is a mistranslation of text and was just written by Matthew to fulfil some prophecy that was written 700 years before in the Old Testament. The actual translation is Young Woman, but they used the Greek which is Virgin. The Book of Matthew is one of the few books which says this about the Virgin Birth and seemed to be following prophecy and that Roman Gods talked about at the time had Virgin Births i.e Romulus. They even said that Ceasar had a Virgin Birth at the time.

 

The Book of Mark (which is an anonymous writer, not called Mark, that was named 100 years after the book was written) was a person who apprently didn't know Jesus because he didn't write Aramaic or Hebrew. The Book of Matthew is a carbon copy of Mark i.e of the 661 verses in Mark, 601 are copied in Matthew while 60% are copied from Mark by the Book of Luke.

[InfiniteNow]

I basically reject the premise of the question ["where would morals come from without theism" asked by Modest], since theism is a very poor source of morality. All we need to do is examine it critically for a few moments.

 

You've already referenced some astrocities, but let's also look at calls to stone your wife if she's not a virgin on your wedding night, or the vast tribal massacres not only sactioned by god, but downright demanded by him. Even in the new testament the treatment of slaves indicates clearly how these texts should not be used by any sane person as a source of morality. They mention how it's not only okay to have slaves, but it's also okay to beat them as long as you don't hurt their eyes or teeth. Well, I sure am glad they handed us THAT pearl of ancient wisdom.

 

These guidelines are based on Iron age tribal nonsense, and we can do far better. In other religions, it takes the opinion of two women to equal that of one man. A woman cannot leave the house without her husband unless she is fully covered up, and she must stick to dark alleys so as not to be seen or interact with others. She cannot look anyone in the eye, nor speak, even if the intent of her words is to find help for someone who is in need. However could we survive without such wisdom, I can't say.

 

All one must do is look to books like Leviticus or Romans to see the pettiness and unpallatable instructions being provided. People, however, choose to reject these teachings. They know that those instructions are not moral, and that they should be rejected. Well, it sure would appear that their sense of morality is coming from somewhere else if it's not coming from the book from which they are picking and choosing stories to live by.

 

I ask... name one moral action performed or one moral statement made by a religious person which could not equally be performed or stated by a non-believer, or an athiest. Just one. Take your time. No rush.

 

All I am asking for is one example.

 

 

Now, name one immoral action performed or one immoral comment made by a religious person expressly on the basis of their religion, stemming directly from the beliefs into which they've been indoctrinated. You've already thought of 3 or 4, and will have thought of more by the end of the day.

 

 

Morality does not come from religion, it is innate and simply sculpted by culture. Even 3 year olds have been shown trying to comfort other children who were sad or in tears. Monkeys and other apes understand concepts of fairness and equality, as demonstrated time and again in experiment after experiment.

 

Morality doesn't need rigid structures. It stems from our evolved condition being pack animals. The dominant animal in the group sets the behaviors and those that choose not to follow them get ostracized from the group. This decreases their likelihood of survival, and also drastically decreases their reproductive potential. This logic even applies to wolf packs.

 

Morality comes from something far more profound than some fear of punishment from a trite, petty cosmic dictator, something much more beautiful. I find it much more inspiring to think that one would help the poor, or feed the hungry, or vaccinate the children of the 3rd world, or help the elderly or a young child because they want to, because it's the right thing to do. It limits the potency of those acts if someone is doing it on the basis of some fear of punishment based on codes written in some book from which they've picked and choosed which to follow and which to ignore.

 

Religion and belief makes people feel justified in committing disgusting acts, and that's no morality at all. If we need to describe morality, there is no better way to do so than with logic, reason, and critical thinking, and that's what I advocate.

 

 

I thought the "How do atheists have morals" question had it's own thread, but this was all I found, so I quoted myself for context. Some new information:

 

 

Monkeys have a sense of morality, say scientists - Times Online

 

"Some researchers believe we could owe our consciences to climate change and, in particular, to a period of intense global warming between 50,000 and 800,000 years ago. The proto-humans living in the forests had to adapt to living on hostile open plains, where they would have been easy prey for formidable predators such as big cats.

 

This would have forced them to devise rules for hunting in groups and sharing food.

 

Christopher Boehm, director of the Jane Goodall Research Center, part of the University of Southern California's anthropology department, believes such humans devised codes to stop bigger, stronger males hogging all the food.

 

"To ensure fair meat distribution, hunting bands had to gang up physically against alpha males," he said. This theory has been borne out by studies of contemporary hunter-gatherer tribes.

 

In research released at the AAAS he argued that under such a system those who broke the rules would have been killed, their "amoral" genes lost to posterity. By contrast, those who abided by the rules would have had many more children."

 

 

Via PZ:

 

"Collins has argued that one piece of evidence for god is the human moral sense, which he claims could not have evolved. I guess we're going to have to call monkeys our brothers and sisters then, since researchers have found that monkeys have a sense of morality. (Let me guess; he'll just push the magic moment of ensoulment back another 30 million years.) Furthermore, they have explanations for how altruism could have evolved."

[Pyrotex]

Excellent points, InfNow. :)

 

Statements like "morality could not have evolved or appeared naturally--they had to be created by a higher intelligence" are typical of the Religilous. There is no attempt to demonstrate why this must be true, or to demonstrate that there is no counter-evidence in the observable world. They just declare it true without any rational support at all.

 

Then WE look around and find counter-evidence galore. Which the Religilous ignore.

 

Morality is just behavior. A kind or subset of social behavior.

 

Behavior can get you kilt or ostracized before you have a chance to have offspring. This is sometimes called "stupid" behavior. Or "dysfunctional" behavior.

Then there is behavior that can increase your chances of having a harmonious, functional, cooperative and procreative life. Odd as this may seem, we often call this "moral" behavior.

 

As an atheist, I practice moral behavior, and a strict set of ethical conduct. Is that difficult? Yes, sometimes. So why do I do it? Because I want a "good" life. I want to be respected and loved. I want for my life to count for something. I want to accomplish something worthwhile. Morals and ethics powerfully affect the possibility that I will succeed.

[goku]

do we live in the same world?

watching the news, it seems to me that morals are few and far between.

is that evidence?

[C1ay]

watching the news, it seems to me that morals are few and far between.

is that evidence?

 

Evidence of what the media feels like covering......

[goku]

Evidence of what the media feels like covering......

 

and is that moral?

if man evolved to have morals, we must still be evolving as it seems we are loosing our morals

[klungo76]

Imagine all the people, living for today