I dont want to get into a debate about is or is there not sufficient evidence to support one or another of modern scientific theories ..we would lose sight of big picture. I will admit however that i have [conditional] faith in materialism. Why? Because Materialism WORKS! We see this time and time again. Our [materialists] models of the universe WORK! Models that are logical, internally consistent, and immensely useful. You drive a car instead of walking.. why, because we [materialist] with our materialistic tools made this possible for you. If left up to you and your spiritual friends we'd all still be walking in sandals You are no longer afraid of Sun.. we applied out tools to nature and now you [spiritualists] no longer feel need to sacrifice virgins to appease your irrational fears. TIME AND TIME AGAIN... RESULTS! TANGIBLE, VISIBLE, REPRODUCIBLE, RELIABLE RESULTS!! So yes i have "faith" that materialism works [i have lots of evidence for this] and i have faith that we will get closer to a valid model of life origins in time. Just like we have with many many other debunked creationist concepts. .. time and time again. Vitalism [Spiritualism] is NOT a prescription for thinking or understanding, quite the opposite --a declaration that certain things are not to be thought of any further. Materialism is valid in that we see it work time and time again. Much evidence to have "faith" in materialism. This is the rational position.
Yes, but you are "preaching to the choir". I agree that materialism works as well. Imo materialism explains the majority of phenomenon that we experience on this planet. But I brought up cases where it takes faith to believe that materialism could explain the phenomenon involved. And that's my point - we are both religious and both people of "faith". You just do not have faith in God; you have faith that there is no God.
You drive a car instead of walking.. why, because we [materialist] with our materialistic tools made this possible for you. If left up to you and your spiritual friends we'd all still be walking in sandals For starters I want Him to do away with famine and pestilence and suffering and death beginning with the children working up to us atheists.. Then sprinkle a good strong dose of Happiness over good ol mother Earth so we can all live in peace and harmony. Longshot _______________________________________________ In this idealistic world you describe why would you need a car or medicine etc. You,re going to live forever and never get hungry. So if you have all the time in eternity and food is everywhere abundant and free for the taking why would you need the scientific creations you describe. You wouldn't even need sandals if your feet never wore out. On a seperate issue do you wear clothes and why? Did that practice evolve?
no, you couldn't be more wrong we are nothing alike. i am not a person of blind faith. you are caught up in meaningless semantics [as theists more often than not, do]
Okay, let me put it this way and maybe that will help. Let's say that you have two theories to explain all the phenomenon in our universe. Let's say theory A can explain 90/100 observations and is well-understood but fails miserably on 10/100 observations. Then let's say there is theory B that explains 100/100 observations but is not well-understood. Who is more rational/irrational? Let me put it yet a different way. Imo straight materialism fails miserably in explaining many of the "spectacular" phenomenon in our universe: 1) the Big Bang "explosion" 2) the origin of life 3) macroevolution and 4) formation of a life bearing planet and 5) the coincidence of the fine tuning of the parameters of the universe, etc. Imo (and yes I admit it's my opinion) this means it's time to throw out materialism since it cannot even explain our own universe. That is part of the scientific method: throw out theories that cannot even explain the phenomenon you are trying to explain. Do you have to agree with me and become a traditional theist? Of course not! Most of the "alternative" cosmologists/scientists that I mentioned in the other thread are not orthodox Christians. There is a wide variety of beliefs including pantheists, deists, spinozans, non-theistic anthropists, etc. etc. But they are all united by a willingness to admit that traditional materialism cannot explain many of the basics in our universe. Of course, I would rather that everyone would agree with me and become a humble but lovable orthodox theist, but of course that isn't going to happen. So I'm just saying, "Why believe in a theory that cannot explain some of the most basic events in our universe's history?" And, whatever you do, don't claim to be a "materialist w/o faith"?
There is another huge danger to what you are saying here. You are basically saying that you are only willing to look within the framework of your own paradigm. This could be like post-Newtonian astronomers saying, "Newton works, so I am only going to consider Newtonian mechanics." Let me illustrate with an example from agnostic philosopher John Leslie. He came up with the well-known sharp shooter example where he imagines himself tied to a post, awaiting his execution by a firing squad. When the fity sharpshooters all miss, to say to oneself, "If they hadn't all missed then I would not be considering the affair" is not an adequate response; in other words, someone in that situaiotn is required to be truly surprised that he is still alive. And, of course, that is exactly the situation we find ourselves in the universe. It is probabilistically virtually impossible that we are alive and we must not ignore the question but ask, "Was this outcome designed or was it just stochastics?" And in our case, it was not fifty sharp shooter but more like a million billion trillion quadrillion sharpshooters...
You drive a car instead of walking.. why, because we [materialist] with our materialistic tools made this possible for you. If left up to you and your spiritual friends we'd all still be walking in sandals For starters I want Him to do away with famine and pestilence and suffering and death beginning with the children working up to us atheists.. Then sprinkle a good strong dose of Happiness over good ol mother Earth so we can all live in peace and harmony. Longshot ____________________________________________ I 'll try to be more clear this time. The ideal world you describe here boils down to two wishes, the end of death and a dose of happiness. These two would cover all the others if they were taken care of. This a pretty close description of the Garden of Eden senario in Genesis. There was no death and no conflict. If you read the end of that story about what is called the "fall" you will see that that is where death entered the human race and conflict began. Adam and Eve supposedly chose conflict and death over the opposite and what we have now ensued. What I was trying to point out to you is that if you had to choose to turn your life and decisions over to God to get freedom from death and conflict, from what you now say, you would probably choose to leave things just as they are and accept death and conflict rather than God. The cars, medicine and most all modern scientific achievements are only needed to gather food and to try to extend life (medicine for sure). If you automatically lived forever you wouldn't need medicine and food would be plentiful and free. No conflict and happiness would be everywhere.
you're entitled to your opinion but that's is all you have. if vague belief is enuf for you, knock yourself out
prove god's existence or get off the pot. if you cant provide credible evidence then your words are empty. and quit creating imaginary "paradigms" to cloud the real issue -- ie YOU HAVE NO PROOF! its that simple. yet you still cling to this belief. my guess is you must need this "spiritual" comfort because you're not operating from the rational perspective.