Hmmm - a robust arguement?

Hello everybody,

Last week I was wandering the shops during my office lunch break when
I was harassed by a religeous zealot selling magazines and CDS.

Feeling argumentative I asked him whether he was (1) a creationalist
and (2) a "Young Universe" creationalist - i.e. one who believes that
dinosaurs etc didnt exist and that the universe is about 4,500 years
old...

When he replied that, yes, he didnt believe in evolution, dinosaurs
(and women's rights I assume) I suggested that he was a little
misguided.

In evidence I said "how come you can see all of the stars at night
then? After all, many of them are clearly more than 4,500 light years
away?"

He told me that "astronomy is a souless science - they lie to you".

Hmmph. He was obviously a ****, but is my line of arguemnt sound -
i.e. that you can see (or even detect) stars more than say 10,000
lightyears away a robust argument against a "young" view of
creation/existance?

Cheers!

Rob
Sheffield

In sci.physics Murf wrote:
Hello everybody,

Last week I was wandering the shops during my office lunch break when
I was harassed by a religeous zealot selling magazines and CDS.

Feeling argumentative I asked him whether he was (1) a creationalist
and (2) a "Young Universe" creationalist - i.e. one who believes that
dinosaurs etc didnt exist and that the universe is about 4,500 years
old...

When he replied that, yes, he didnt believe in evolution, dinosaurs
(and women's rights I assume) I suggested that he was a little
misguided.

In evidence I said "how come you can see all of the stars at night
then? After all, many of them are clearly more than 4,500 light years
away?"

He told me that "astronomy is a souless science - they lie to you".

Hmmph. He was obviously a ****, but is my line of arguemnt sound -
i.e. that you can see (or even detect) stars more than say 10,000
lightyears away a robust argument against a "young" view of
creation/existance?

Cheers!

Rob
Sheffield

If you posit an infinitely powerful god, he could blink the stars,
light, and dinosaur bones into existence at any time with any
characteristics he chooses.

So no, there is no possible argument other than such a being doesn't
exist or this god wouldn't do that, so you are back to belief.


--
Jim Pennino

Remove -spam-sux to reply.

wrote in message ...
[snip]
If you posit an infinitely powerful god, he could blink the stars,
light, and dinosaur bones into existence at any time with any
characteristics he chooses.

So no, there is no possible argument other than such a being doesn't
exist or this god wouldn't do that, so you are back to belief.

This is generically known as "last Thursdayism" and has another more
official name of "Omphalism" that gets its name from a fancy term for
belly button.

It's an insidious notion. If you posit that the evidence of age
could have been created rather than actually grown that way through
the time it appears to have done, then you have a problem. How do
you know *you* existed last Thursday? Or yesterday? Or a half hour
ago? You *could* have been created with all those memories exactly
correct to make you *think* you existed in the past. If a deity could
and would fake such things as huge quantities of fossils, diverse
genetic information, etc. etc., then why couldn't such a deity fake
your own memory?

In fact, you don't even have to be continuous. Maybe it's easier for
a deity to let you exist on every alternate second leap year, and let
other entities have existence on some kind of time share. So, you might
exist for a second, then not exist for a few years, then exist again
for a second with only the memory of the years in between. How would
you ever possibly know? If an entity exists with the ability to create
light from stars that *APPEARS* billions of years old, and to do so
effectively instantly, why shouldn't such an entity be able to create
you with the memory of having existed a half hour ago?

The only real answer to such notions is: They don't belong in science
because they are not applicable to the jobs and tasks of science.
Because there isn't really any way to predict anything from them,
or test them. If you posit an arbitrarily powerful entity that can
do such tricks, then as long as that entity chooses not to let us
know about him, (or remember knowing about him) then there's not a
damn thing we can ever do with the notion.
Socks

wrote in
om:

wrote in message
... [snip]
If you posit an infinitely powerful god, he could blink the stars,
light, and dinosaur bones into existence at any time with any
characteristics he chooses.

So no, there is no possible argument other than such a being doesn't
exist or this god wouldn't do that, so you are back to belief.

This is generically known as "last Thursdayism" and has another more
official name of "Omphalism" that gets its name from a fancy term for
belly button.

It's an insidious notion. If you posit that the evidence of age
could have been created rather than actually grown that way through
the time it appears to have done, then you have a problem. How do
you know *you* existed last Thursday? Or yesterday? Or a half hour
ago? You *could* have been created with all those memories exactly
correct to make you *think* you existed in the past. If a deity could
and would fake such things as huge quantities of fossils, diverse
genetic information, etc. etc., then why couldn't such a deity fake
your own memory?

In fact, you don't even have to be continuous. Maybe it's easier for
a deity to let you exist on every alternate second leap year, and let
other entities have existence on some kind of time share. So, you
might exist for a second, then not exist for a few years, then exist
again for a second with only the memory of the years in between. How
would you ever possibly know? If an entity exists with the ability to
create light from stars that *APPEARS* billions of years old, and to
do so effectively instantly, why shouldn't such an entity be able to
create you with the memory of having existed a half hour ago?

The only real answer to such notions is: They don't belong in science
because they are not applicable to the jobs and tasks of science.
Because there isn't really any way to predict anything from them,
or test them. If you posit an arbitrarily powerful entity that can
do such tricks, then as long as that entity chooses not to let us
know about him, (or remember knowing about him) then there's not a
damn thing we can ever do with the notion.
Socks


Yes. Another problem with the appearance of age/omphalism type of
argument is that it implies that the deity is being deliberately
deceitful - i.e planting false evidence.

LK.

And if a deity is planting false evidence what is he hiding. It also doesn't
set a very good example to those that follow him.

Like Socrates points out Gods can only do the good things and that the bad
things are man made because Gods would not do harm to mortals. He was trying
to prove that stories about Gods doing wrong were false truths.

Allen
"Llanzlan Klazmon" wrote in message
7.6...
wrote in
om:

wrote in message
... [snip]
If you posit an infinitely powerful god, he could blink the stars,
light, and dinosaur bones into existence at any time with any
characteristics he chooses.

So no, there is no possible argument other than such a being doesn't
exist or this god wouldn't do that, so you are back to belief.

This is generically known as "last Thursdayism" and has another more
official name of "Omphalism" that gets its name from a fancy term for
belly button.

It's an insidious notion. If you posit that the evidence of age
could have been created rather than actually grown that way through
the time it appears to have done, then you have a problem. How do
you know *you* existed last Thursday? Or yesterday? Or a half hour
ago? You *could* have been created with all those memories exactly
correct to make you *think* you existed in the past. If a deity could
and would fake such things as huge quantities of fossils, diverse
genetic information, etc. etc., then why couldn't such a deity fake
your own memory?

In fact, you don't even have to be continuous. Maybe it's easier for
a deity to let you exist on every alternate second leap year, and let
other entities have existence on some kind of time share. So, you
might exist for a second, then not exist for a few years, then exist
again for a second with only the memory of the years in between. How
would you ever possibly know? If an entity exists with the ability to
create light from stars that *APPEARS* billions of years old, and to
do so effectively instantly, why shouldn't such an entity be able to
create you with the memory of having existed a half hour ago?

The only real answer to such notions is: They don't belong in science
because they are not applicable to the jobs and tasks of science.
Because there isn't really any way to predict anything from them,
or test them. If you posit an arbitrarily powerful entity that can
do such tricks, then as long as that entity chooses not to let us
know about him, (or remember knowing about him) then there's not a
damn thing we can ever do with the notion.
Socks


Yes. Another problem with the appearance of age/omphalism type of
argument is that it implies that the deity is being deliberately
deceitful - i.e planting false evidence.

LK.

"Allen Whittaker" wrote in message
...
And if a deity is planting false evidence what is he hiding. It also
doesn't
set a very good example to those that follow him.

Like Socrates points out Gods can only do the good things and that the bad
things are man made because Gods would not do harm to mortals. He was
trying
to prove that stories about Gods doing wrong were false truths.

Allen


Here you have confounded the concept of the creator of the Universe with the
ultimate moral standard. That's only really only true in a few religions -
even Christianinty has a devil. The 30 billion Gods in the Hindu pantheon
appear to have the moral leadership of reality show contestants, and have no
problems routinely blighting the lives of Indian peasants.

However, the argument against a God being untruthful is far more compelling.
It means we cannot be sure of internal consistency. If God can make all the
photons in the Universe appear in one blink, he can make them all disappear
in the next blink. What's the point of building observatories, if this is
the case?

And for those who have enjoyed this thread (as I certainly have) may I
recommend an SF author Greg Egan. He has explored many similar themes. One
of his better is "Permutation City", where the premise is that human
personalities are stored inside computers. This has been done before and
since, but its an excellent treatment, particularly if you have some
interest in computer science (eg Turing machines). Many other books have
have a mathematical slant, and he knows what he is talking about, and he
turns these ideas into rip-roaring SF yarns.




"Llanzlan Klazmon" wrote in message
7.6...
wrote in
om:

wrote in message
... [snip]
If you posit an infinitely powerful god, he could blink the stars,
light, and dinosaur bones into existence at any time with any
characteristics he chooses.

So no, there is no possible argument other than such a being doesn't
exist or this god wouldn't do that, so you are back to belief.

This is generically known as "last Thursdayism" and has another more
official name of "Omphalism" that gets its name from a fancy term for
belly button.

It's an insidious notion. If you posit that the evidence of age
could have been created rather than actually grown that way through
the time it appears to have done, then you have a problem. How do
you know *you* existed last Thursday? Or yesterday? Or a half hour
ago? You *could* have been created with all those memories exactly
correct to make you *think* you existed in the past. If a deity could
and would fake such things as huge quantities of fossils, diverse
genetic information, etc. etc., then why couldn't such a deity fake
your own memory?

In fact, you don't even have to be continuous. Maybe it's easier for
a deity to let you exist on every alternate second leap year, and let
other entities have existence on some kind of time share. So, you
might exist for a second, then not exist for a few years, then exist
again for a second with only the memory of the years in between. How
would you ever possibly know? If an entity exists with the ability to
create light from stars that *APPEARS* billions of years old, and to
do so effectively instantly, why shouldn't such an entity be able to
create you with the memory of having existed a half hour ago?

The only real answer to such notions is: They don't belong in science
because they are not applicable to the jobs and tasks of science.
Because there isn't really any way to predict anything from them,
or test them. If you posit an arbitrarily powerful entity that can
do such tricks, then as long as that entity chooses not to let us
know about him, (or remember knowing about him) then there's not a
damn thing we can ever do with the notion.
Socks


Yes. Another problem with the appearance of age/omphalism type of
argument is that it implies that the deity is being deliberately
deceitful - i.e planting false evidence.

LK.

wrote:
In sci.physics Murf wrote:

Hello everybody,

Last week I was wandering the shops during my office lunch break when
I was harassed by a religeous zealot selling magazines and CDS.

Feeling argumentative I asked him whether he was (1) a creationalist
and (2) a "Young Universe" creationalist - i.e. one who believes that
dinosaurs etc didnt exist and that the universe is about 4,500 years
old...

When he replied that, yes, he didnt believe in evolution, dinosaurs
(and women's rights I assume) I suggested that he was a little
misguided.

In evidence I said "how come you can see all of the stars at night
then? After all, many of them are clearly more than 4,500 light years
away?"

He told me that "astronomy is a souless science - they lie to you".

Hmmph. He was obviously a ****, but is my line of arguemnt sound -
i.e. that you can see (or even detect) stars more than say 10,000
lightyears away a robust argument against a "young" view of
creation/existance?

If you posit an infinitely powerful god, he could blink the stars,
light, and dinosaur bones into existence at any time with any
characteristics he chooses.

You do not let them posit the existance of any god. Require them to
establish the existence of a god first and then one with the specific
characteristics needed for creation as they claim it occurred. Do not
permit circular arguments of the god-creation-world-god kind.

So no, there is no possible argument other than such a being doesn't
exist or this god wouldn't do that, so you are back to belief.

Hang out on talk.origins. It is rather easy to deal with them. It is
also a good place to see what happens when you depart from the same
rules you would apply when questioning any claim in any real science.

--
Should all countries imitate Israel and have
jews-only neighborhoods?
-- The Iron Webmaster, 3266

When ever you try to combin science and religion it never seems to work out.
But there are some ways in which I think you can believe in both. The Bible
was written for the most part by man, Save a few parts which are direct
words from God. Because of this man is not perfect so how can we create a
perfect book? we can't, but we tried.

How can the bible explain all the stars? it says God created the Heavens and
the Earth but lacks the meaning of each. Since the bible was written by man
we know that we would only have knowledge of this planet and not others.

In the end it creates alot of questions that are not easily answered. But to
get back on track, anyone that says the world is only 4500 years old is
false. Sumer was around 4000bce, meaning 6000 years ago. And we have dated
objects back to about 8000 and 9000 bce, meaning just as the last ice age
ended at about 12000bce.

Whats interesting is that in Sumer texts they talk of a great flood story
that destroyed all the lands and that one man was chosen to save animals and
his family. Sounds like another story I know of about a man called Noah. But
the sumer story was written around 2700bce, about 4700 years ago. Far to
early for the bible to have been written.

When you look at the bible then, I think they were taking these histories
and trying to put it into the views of God. After all if he was around now
he would have been around then?

Being a historian and haveing a strong faith is hard.

Allen Whittaker

"Murf" wrote in message
om...
Hello everybody,

Last week I was wandering the shops during my office lunch break when
I was harassed by a religeous zealot selling magazines and CDS.

Feeling argumentative I asked him whether he was (1) a creationalist
and (2) a "Young Universe" creationalist - i.e. one who believes that
dinosaurs etc didnt exist and that the universe is about 4,500 years
old...

When he replied that, yes, he didnt believe in evolution, dinosaurs
(and women's rights I assume) I suggested that he was a little
misguided.

In evidence I said "how come you can see all of the stars at night
then? After all, many of them are clearly more than 4,500 light years
away?"

He told me that "astronomy is a souless science - they lie to you".

Hmmph. He was obviously a ****, but is my line of arguemnt sound -
i.e. that you can see (or even detect) stars more than say 10,000
lightyears away a robust argument against a "young" view of
creation/existance?

Cheers!

Rob
Sheffield

In sci.physics Allen Whittaker wrote:
When ever you try to combin science and religion it never seems to work out.
But there are some ways in which I think you can believe in both. The Bible
was written for the most part by man, Save a few parts which are direct
words from God. Because of this man is not perfect so how can we create a
perfect book? we can't, but we tried.

How can the bible explain all the stars? it says God created the Heavens and
the Earth but lacks the meaning of each. Since the bible was written by man
we know that we would only have knowledge of this planet and not others.

In the end it creates alot of questions that are not easily answered. But to
get back on track, anyone that says the world is only 4500 years old is
false. Sumer was around 4000bce, meaning 6000 years ago. And we have dated
objects back to about 8000 and 9000 bce, meaning just as the last ice age
ended at about 12000bce.

Whats interesting is that in Sumer texts they talk of a great flood story
that destroyed all the lands and that one man was chosen to save animals and
his family. Sounds like another story I know of about a man called Noah. But
the sumer story was written around 2700bce, about 4700 years ago. Far to
early for the bible to have been written.

When you look at the bible then, I think they were taking these histories
and trying to put it into the views of God. After all if he was around now
he would have been around then?

Being a historian and haveing a strong faith is hard.

Allen Whittaker

Those that I know that understand science and believe in a religion
generally take the position that such stories are parables.

From that position, a god created the universe; the mechanism he used was
the big bang. Nothing to reconcile there.

Everything becomes intractable and orthogonal from the literal position,
i.e. that the world is only 4500 years old.

My favorite quote on the subject:

"In the beginning the Universe was created.

This has made a lot of people very angry and been widely regarded as a
bad move."

Douglas Adams, "The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy"



--
Jim Pennino

Remove -spam-sux to reply.

wrote:
In sci.physics Allen Whittaker wrote:

When ever you try to combin science and religion it never seems to work out.
But there are some ways in which I think you can believe in both. The Bible
was written for the most part by man, Save a few parts which are direct
words from God. Because of this man is not perfect so how can we create a
perfect book? we can't, but we tried.


How can the bible explain all the stars? it says God created the Heavens and
the Earth but lacks the meaning of each. Since the bible was written by man
we know that we would only have knowledge of this planet and not others.


In the end it creates alot of questions that are not easily answered. But to
get back on track, anyone that says the world is only 4500 years old is
false. Sumer was around 4000bce, meaning 6000 years ago. And we have dated
objects back to about 8000 and 9000 bce, meaning just as the last ice age
ended at about 12000bce.


Whats interesting is that in Sumer texts they talk of a great flood story
that destroyed all the lands and that one man was chosen to save animals and
his family. Sounds like another story I know of about a man called Noah. But
the sumer story was written around 2700bce, about 4700 years ago. Far to
early for the bible to have been written.


When you look at the bible then, I think they were taking these histories
and trying to put it into the views of God. After all if he was around now
he would have been around then?


Being a historian and haveing a strong faith is hard.


Allen Whittaker


Those that I know that understand science and believe in a religion
generally take the position that such stories are parables.

From that position, a god created the universe; the mechanism he used was
the big bang. Nothing to reconcile there.

Everything becomes intractable and orthogonal from the literal position,
i.e. that the world is only 4500 years old.

My favorite quote on the subject:

"In the beginning the Universe was created.

This has made a lot of people very angry and been widely regarded as a
bad move."

Douglas Adams, "The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy"




What I have ingrained into myself about God is this: God is the who and
the why of the Universe, which leaves us with figuring out the what,
where, and how. To me science is worship (not scientology).