dpb

Creation of what

JTaylor

C.S.Lewis distinguishes between myth and true myth. The former is an important cultural artefact that contains significant truths, but isn't rooted in history, the latter has the same qualities, but actually happened! His essay, if you're interested, is Myth became fact, although it doesn't appear to be widely available on the web.

ditchmyster

iTrader: (7)

Pay attention, you just quoted my theory's about how Life and Religion were "Created" on the previous page.

See doesn't take long, no need to dwell on either subject spending your relatively short existence on this mortal plane pondering the meaning of life and your purpose / position in the greater scheme of things, many a far superior mind than those present on this board were unable to arrive at a conclusion and the subject has literally been done to death or should that be until.

A fully functioning mind and body is a precious gift, I prefer to enjoy it while I'm able than consume my time pondering over it.

ncj

I did read it Ditch, but i didnt concur . Im glad you see a fully functioning mind and body as a gift, so do i ! At least we agree on something

ncj

The universe and everything. Its just nice to throw around a few ideas and see what people have to say.

Turbohot

Yes, and we all have some.

Some would let them overflow, some would let them run deep as very precious and personal undercurrents.

JTaylor

This link has some extracts from said essay:

http://wbs.eu.com/download.php?url=/...0on%20myth.pdf

neil-h

This sums up my thoughts on the subject quite nicely. We are all different and we all need different things to help us through the day. If religion works for someone then that's fine by me.

Turbohot

So, The Wossy didn't touch on God at all, and kept it fairly light-hearted to the point that I thought Stephen Fry was wasted on that show. One lie was spoken as well from Fry that he hasn't made any news all for a while. Anyway, I thought that the short comedian/actor and Flintoff gave out more sparks out than the Fry. Jones looked pretty as ever.

So, yeah, it was quite a disappointment with Fry not being fried or frying at all on slightly higher temperature. Gay marriage isn't such a hot topic any more, so it just doesn't retain the capacity to warm up the audience.

Flintoff is afraid of ghosts and doesn't like the dark, and that was funny.

dpb

Is it , is it really

lozgti1

ive had lunch with Freddy

Turbohot

Nice! I'm not a fan, but he was good on Wossy last night. He seems to be a good lad. Quite down to earth with no frills attached. He was even running around a chippy van for a TV show lately.

Like you're saying that you've had lunch with him, he said that he met Stephen Hawking once. he seemed quite chuffed with that. I would be, too; tbh.

JTaylor

Whilst I'm confident that the highlighted sentiment is coming from a good place, to my eyes, it is damning faith in the Lord with faint praise. For me the worship of God is consideration of the eternal, not the petty and the mundane.

To whom do you give thanks for your existence and for beauty and love and courage and honour? When you look to the heavens does your heart skip a beat in wonder? Every second of our life is awesome!

dpb

Mum an dad

Yep , mainly vertigo

It certainly is

thenewgalaxy

Oh yeah!

Turbohot

Shame she lost Bafta, and Fry called Eddie Redmayne a wonderful Reddie Edmayne after him receiving his Best Leading Actor award for The Theory of Everything. There's a good chance that our Eddie may deep fry our overtly pompous dictionary on legs Mr. Fry for that later at the gala dinner tonight.

ditchmyster

iTrader: (7)

JTaylor

A gift from whom?

Blue by You

iTrader: (23)

Is that what is known as a 'Gotcha'?

dpb

Is he being speshial ?, iv just explained where the "gift" came from

Geezer

Well, that is a good question. There is only matter or energy in the Universe, so I am happy it is one, or both. What do you define it as?

Until the above question is answered, then this is still relevant.

He has to be. I know it's an old cliched one, but can he create an object that is so heavy he cannot move it, for example? Everything is bound by something.
See above

We will obviously just have to agree to diagree on that one!

Thanks for taking the time, that was very interesting and insightful. Obviously I would not reach the same conclusion, but it was an honest and open answer. At the end of the day, you have never struck me as someone who is a 'God botherer', nor have you ever tried to shove your beliefs down people's throats, merely discussed them and defended them. If what you believe brings you comfort or peace, that's great. It's good to discuss though with someone who has well thought out and constructed responses, even if I don't agree with them.

Unlike on another forum where they try to convince you that man walked with dinosaurs........

hodgy0_2

but some would say - I believe Dawkins is one, that this is a more honest and cogent argument

otherwise you simply have a "god of the gaps" argument - where, as you suggest, God is simply pushed further and further back by an ever increasing knowledge and understanding of the world/universe we live in

JTaylor

Well, I have to tread carefully for a couple of reasons. The first is that no exemplary definition of the soul exists; not even in scripture. There are two dominant schools of thought and they are a) monist - that is we are a soul and a body and that they are one and b) dualist - that is we are both a soul and a body and that they are distinct from one another. Good men disagree on which of these is 'correct' and at the moment I'm sat on the fence. The second reason for treading carefully is that I'm dealing with the unseen and the borderline ineffable and certainly the mysterious; I'm conscious that this moves things quite markedly in to the realms of faith. Having said that, an overwhelming majority of theologians agree that the soul is immaterial. I think I can confidently say that if the soul exists (and I believe it does) it is neither energy nor matter. If that is true, it renders moot your point about 'heaven' (which we've yet to define) becoming full. For your proposition to stand you'd have to prove a) that the soul existed and b) that it was material and c) that even if it was material, heaven was finite. You'd be better off denying the existence of the soul and simply claiming a materialist or physicalist position. Just be careful that in so doing you don't deny your own essence.

See above.

This is nonsensical linguistic trickery or sophistry. I believe some bright spark came up with a mathematical paradox to answer this, but all that does is dignify the proposition. Again you'd be better off simply denying the existence of God. Don't forget that to do this is to remove the only answer to the philosophical problem of infinite regress.

It was my pleasure, thank you for your kind words and for giving me the opportunity to discuss my passion.

Geezer

I think this is quite an interesting one, as I find that fact that all this has come about throught the re-arrangement of hydrogen atoms over 13.7 billions years far more impressive then the notion that it was designed and made by someone. You are quite correct, every second of my life is awesome (apart from a hangover I had last week), but the wonderment, for me, does not depend on beliefs like yours. It's amazing as it is, no extras needed!

JTaylor

Dawkins would say that, wouldn't he? It pushes the case for theism in to the realms of the absurd and therefore strengthens the case for scientism, the church of which he is the high priest.

Yes, apologists need to avoid a God of the gaps argument. As Newton found when he came up against Laplace, science has a habit of debunking 'bad' theism.

JTaylor

Dawkins answers this well in Unweaving the Rainbow, but he doesn't deal with infinite regress, he doesn't deal (satisfactorily) with the moral argument, he doesn't deal (again, satisfactorily) with the cosmological argument (fine-tuning) and so forth. He peddles a soulless, nihilistic physicalist mantra that I find wholly arrogant and excluding. If you think God is a tyrant, look a little deeper in to Dawkins' neurons.

hodgy0_2

What can be asserted without evidence can be dismissed without evidence.

JTaylor

Christopher Hitchens 2003.

Turbohot

Ha ha.

What about their mum and dad and their mum and dad's mum and dad, and then, their mum and dad and so back, hm? Have a think before your brain shatters!

ditchmyster

iTrader: (7)

Luck of the draw, we don't get to choose our genes.