Life began 25 years ago

I was just thinking, this could all be an illusion anyway. I have had some conscious appreciation that a world surrounds me since I was born. But like my little black and white cat, do I really know what lies beyond "the view from my window"? If God exists, and he were an all-powerful one, would he not have the power to confuse my very senses? Evolution is a scientific matter, with (please admit it) some faith intersparsed, while religious beliefs are mostly belief with maybe some personal scientific experience behind it which cannot be shown and surely never proven to other people. It is personal if you believe, even if you have scientific evidence in your experience. But everyone may want to look inside themselves for just a few moments and realize that they are, in whatever form, a unique personality. I am not you nor can I see through your eyes. An individual am I. Personally, when I look deep enough, I see that the universe need not even exist though it seems to sure enough. What would space be without things inside it? Eternally nothing? Yessiree! What would I be if my mother had waited 31 _more_ days before my father was empassioned with the urge not to use a condom? Well, I dunno, do you? Stretch that back in time, what would my father have been if his parents had waited 31 days to have him, a cell flushed down the toilet? And his father, and his--back thousands of generations. Ever played the lottery? Wow, I feel like an individual soul looking out through these human eyes. I feel so lucky I can't believe it, I must have been placed here. No scientific jargon to cloud your thought, I think I really existed before being placed in this body. Call it eternality, or what you will, either the odds are in my favor or I am one of God's children. Can anyone say one way or the other?
-Brian (who is not a Christian, though maybe Christ is God, or maybe Krishna is, or maybe Allah, or maybe God is just laughing at us for even thinking we know!)

brdean writes:

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Evolution is a scientific matter, with (please admit it) some faith intersparsed

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But that would be a lie. Why do you want us to admit to a lie? Evolution requires no more faith than anything else in science.Are you saying that gravity requires faith? That if you believed really hard, you might not plummet to the ground after jumping off a cliff?

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Call it eternality, or what you will, either the odds are in my favor or I am one of God's children. Can anyone say one way or the other?

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This is an error in mathematics. You are confusing the likelihood of a specific outcome with the likelihood of any outcome.That is, you think there is something significant about you being here as opposed to someone else when that someone else is just as likely as you to be here. We should not be surprised that it is you, specifically, because we were expecting somebody in general.Suppose I have a standard deck of 52 cards and I draw one?What is the probability of me drawing the Ace of Spades?
What is the probability of me drawing an Ace?
What is the probability of me drawing a Spade?
What is the probability of me drawing a black card?
What is the probability of me drawing a card?Notice that the probabilities keep increasing until the last one reaches certainty. If I have a deck of cards and I draw a card, then the probability of me drawing a card is 1. We are not surprised that I drew a card as the process of me drawing a card requires me to draw a card. The process of your parents having a baby requires that they have a baby.If you were to draw a card, why is there any significance to the fact that you drew the Ace of Spades as opposed to the Four of Diamonds? Each one was equally likely to appear. The only conceivable difference is that you have attached an emotional significance to one of the cards and not to the other. That is irrelevant and doesn't mean anything.We are not surprised to find a process that necessarily requires a result actually produces one.------------------
Rrhain
WWJD? JWRTFM!

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I was just thinking, this could all be an illusion anyway.
____Gosh, I was just thinking that too! What a weird illusion, indeed. I am surrounded by illusions of other entities who seem to be having the same illusion as me!Maybe, however, it is not an illusion, and what I am sensing is some manifestation of reality.Maybe, I can communicate about this reality with other individuals who have similar perceptions.Who is to know?

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Evolution is a scientific matter, with (please admit it) some faith intersparsed, while religious beliefs are mostly belief with maybe some personal scientific experience behind it which cannot be shown and surely never proven to other people.

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It is a scientific matter but the faith involved is different than what you may think. The "faith" involved the all of science is wrapped up in methodological naturalism. That is, this method is based on shared observation of the natural world. From earlier in your post you said that life could be an illusion, an idea that Rene Descartes tossed around many years ago. The faith involved in science is that other people exist and they have experiences. By comparing something that we can all experience we can narrow down what is personal illusion. This is why personal experience in science has less meaning than the overall body of scientific experience. If you have more faith in what you experience as compared to the total body of experience then you can fall into the trap of personal delusion.In the end, the evidence that supports the theory of evolution takes no faith other than admitting that other people exist. You are still open to your own interpretation, no matter how foolhardy. However, throwing out data (such as radiometric dating) because of a personal faith is relying on a possible self delusion. So, you have to ask yourself if you believe other people exist and if shared experience is the best method for understanding the world we are in. This is the only leap of faith science asks, no matter the branch of science.

But of course someone would have to inhabit this body, else I be dead. But the difference is that I have a consciousness and can look out from within. I do not feel as a robot which would inhabit the body as the product of some chance arrising. It to me is not chance, but a certainty that I would be in a body, any body. Take, for example, the University professor who has created a digital similation of evolution with little digital organisms who reproduce more efficiently as a reward for performing well a certain process in the computer program. Interesting idea, but now think if those little digital organisms have a consciousness like you and I. We exist as separate living entites, while the digital entites in this man's computers have no such thing. Or do you believe they do? Afterall, to those digital organisms, they have electronic form, function, maybe even a name, and a Universe too. Yet do or could they ever have the consciousness that you and I share? Consciousness seems to me to exist as a product of individual, well, consciousness. Tough to break down further than just the word consciousness. I do not feel to be an evolutionary robot that exists for a short time and then ceases to exist. My existence is a product of something higher than chance, in other words.. Call it what you will, but I am not the only scientific type to believe in something higher, I am no Bible junky, just someone who feels it deep in his gut that there is a greater power which appropriates consciousness to all living beings.
-Brian

"Gosh, I was just thinking that too! What a weird illusion, indeed. I am surrounded by illusions of other entities who seem to be having the same illusion as me!"Ok, you have proven that you are unable to post a kind respectful reply, thanks and hope not to hear back from you..
-Brian

"By comparing something that we can all experience we can narrow down what is personal illusion."Well put, I agree except that an entire society, and everyone in general, could be in illusion to the real reality. Even our collective senses are imperfect and can lead an accepted scientifically observed reality being proven false. I know you know this, it is the nature of science. And I don't propose science just stop in its tracks because "oh no, we might have errors", but all scientists need to recognize that even though evolution is the best theory we have, it may be compltely wrong. And I hope that some are open to admit that should the data lead in that direction.."In the end, the evidence that supports the theory of evolution takes no faith other than admitting that other people exist."Explain this further please. I admit that other people exist. In fact, my stating that this word could be an illusion was not an affirmation that it is, but that it could very well be, we just don't know. You have seen "Matrix", well did the people living their false lives in a computer's imagination find their reality to be illusory?"You are still open to your own interpretation, no matter how foolhardy."Thanks for calling my opinion foolish, I much more respect for you now.

"If you were to draw a card, why is there any significance to the fact that you drew the Ace of Spades as opposed to the Four of Diamonds? Each one was equally likely to appear. The only conceivable difference is that you have attached an emotional significance to one of the cards and not to the other. That is irrelevant and doesn't mean anything."Interesting you should point this out. In an atheistic evolutionary perspective, there are infinite beings that will always be placed into a body, no matter what. But your example of the 52 cards is very similar to what I feel, that there are (even though an incredibly large number) a certain, limited number of souls which have to placed into a body, no matter what. I feel to be one of those "52 cards" which will be drawn for rebirth into another body when I die, lest I exit the cycle of birth and rebirth..

Don't worry.I'm just an illusion.

Technically there is no way for you to know that
you are not alone and imagining everything.That other people appear to experience what you do, does
not show that they exist outside of your own consciouness.Everything that we experience is 'memory' and 'memory'
is known to be unreliable.

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I do not feel to be an evolutionary robot that exists for a short time and then ceases to exist.

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1) Just because you are uncomfortable with the notion that there may be nothing more than nature does not make it so that there is actually anything more than nature.2) There is nothing at all in Evolutionary Theory which requires anyone to think as themselves as a robot, or that nature is all there is.

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My existence is a product of something higher than chance, in other words.

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Of course it is.No life is a product of chance alone.The Theory of Evolution postulates that chance, in the form of random genetic mutation, combined with natural selection, which is the very opposite of chance, is how species change over time.Evolution, in other words, does not work by random chance alone. Why did you think it did?

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Call it what you will, but I am not the only scientific type to believe in something higher, I am no Bible junky, just someone who feels it deep in his gut that there is a greater power which appropriates consciousness to all living beings.

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Your belief is fine, but if you want to call yourself a "science type", I would suggest that you do some self-education WRT the basics of Biology and what the ToE actually states.You have some major misconceptions.Also, your "gut feelings" are irrelevant to the validity of scientific feelings.------------------
"Evolution is a 'theory', just like gravity. If you don't like it, go jump off a bridge."

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but all scientists need to recognize that even though evolution is the best theory we have, it may be compltely wrong. And I hope that some are open to admit that should the data lead in that direction.

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The thing is, the liklihood of the ToE being completely wrong after a century of being confirmed by probably billions of pieces of evidence is very, very, very low.The ToE is arguably the most strongly-supported scientific theory in all of science. We have a better understanding of how Evolution works than we do of Gravity.Our entire society could be mistaken about the Sun being the center of the solar system, that matter is made up of atoms, and that germs cause disease, too.Do you consider the Theory of a Heliocentric Solar System, the Atomic Theory of Matter, or the Germ Theory of Disease to be doubtful or uncertain?The Theory of Evolution has just as much, and in some cases, more and stronger evidence to support it than those other theories.------------------
"Evolution is a 'theory', just like gravity. If you don't like it, go jump off a bridge."

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Just because you are uncomfortable with the notion that there may be nothing more than nature does not make it so that there is actually anything more than nature.

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You tend to think I am scared of one day not existing, when that is not true. How can fear exist if consciousness were to evaporate into nothingness? There is nothing to fear in that.
And please take note, the supernatural, which God is a part of if he exists, is also a part of nature.

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There is nothing at all in Evolutionary Theory which requires anyone to think as themselves as a robot, or that nature is all there is.

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I agree one hundred percent, but my argument rests on the atheistic evolutionary perspective, not a theistic one. An atheistic believer in evolution has a million reasons to justify why his body exists, but, correct me if I am wrong, absolutely none to explain his individuality among other beings. I justify this as follows: Why do you not have a long tongue and live in a swamp with other frogs, instead of having taken up residence in a human body? Notice the difference between "you" and "your body" in the question. Every human being has a complex set of processes firing millions of times every second in their brains. What makes it that _your_ consciousness rules over these processes and resides there instead of in one of the other beings, and at this particular moment in time? In your belief, if your mother had waited 31 days before deciding to have you, would _you_ exist?

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No life is a product of chance alone.

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The Theory of Evolution postulates that chance, in the form of random genetic mutation, combined with natural selection, which is the very opposite of chance, is how species change over time.

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Evolution, in other words, does not work by random chance alone. Why did you think it did?

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You stand corrected, the very basis of evolution is the mutation of the reproductive genome, this requires an error in replication, and this error is a product of chance unless one is in a laboratory. Second, this was entirely off my point. Lets get back to it. My existence and my body are two completely different things. So are yours. My body was _sure_ to be born as my mother had to have the baby come out. This was 100% sure even if my body was stillborn. A body exited my mother. But why _me_? Millions of babies are born all the time, each one an individual personality. Each one infused with the something that makes them alive and feeling.
One step further, when someone dies, it is evident that something about the body is different. No one is interested in marrying and starting a family with a beautiful dead body. The spark of life must be there. That is what sets me apart from my body and you apart from yours. Your brain contains your memories, but _you_ are consciousness itself.

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Your belief is fine, but if you want to call yourself a "science type", I would suggest that you do some self-education WRT the basics of Biology and what the ToE actually states.

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You have some major misconceptions.

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Also, your "gut feelings" are irrelevant to the validity of scientific feelings.

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You are correct that gut feeling does not play a role in the conclusions science makes. Let me break it down and say it then, you may not believe in God because by first and foremost concluding arrogantly that he probably does not exist (or if you do leave some chance that he may exist, this statement doesn't apply to you). "Hey dad, I know you don't really exist, in fact I dislike the very thought that you may exist, but can I have my allowance now?" No, leave some chance that he may be a kinder God than you ever dreamed, leave some room in your science that he may very well have a place in the Universe, and try to find evidence in the way that God communicates it, and then you will have practical scientific experience of this God who eludes you so. This has been my experience which I can in no way communicate to you because one cannot fathom the idea of God until one has learned to give him a try, see the evidence which most are too proud to try and see, and once you have this, learn to trust him, and eventually love him as you'd love your parents or greater.Look, man, I may have misconceptions about evolution, even though it was my greatest area of interest throughout high school and much of college (Virginia Tech tho we's just a bunch o country bumpkins aint we, uhhuh), but think about this: your stating that I have them implies you have none. This pride in knowing a little bit more than your average fellow implies that real knowledge eludes you. The more one knows, the more one realizes that one does not know. Einstein would have concurred.I'll let bygones be bygones before this turns into Jerry Springer. Let's quit the accusatory tone of our discussions (me too) and get down to the science of it. God has a science too, and it's not in any clear way seen to be the Bible! There are thousands of faiths each with their own beliefs. Yet God is above all human belief, just like, thanks Rrhain, gravity. Many of you, the scientists, myself included whether you like it or not, dislike the Biblical portrayal of God. Thanks India. Not that the Indians have it necessarily right either. But they offered me a new idea of God. Have many of you considered that God can be the most cool, accepting, and kind friend? That he has the best sense of humor, is the nicest of the nice, the biggest party-animal, the biggest woman chaser, the most honorable, the most fun, and that he likes his black and tan just a bit heavy on the Guinness? And yet despite all this, that he would have the greatest humility? Heck no, but hey, anyone who even _may have_ had something to do with making Laeticia Casta can't be all that bad! When I die, I hope to slap the Man some skin and have a few beers at the bar, discuss the pros and cons of evolution theory...-Brian[This message has been edited by brdean, 12-15-2003]

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Do you consider the Theory of a Heliocentric Solar System, the Atomic Theory of Matter, or the Germ Theory of Disease to be doubtful or uncertain?

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The Theory of Evolution has just as much, and in some cases, more and stronger evidence to support it than those other theories.

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The theory of gravity can be witnessed, diseases can be witnessed, the Universe can be seen to turn each day and that the Sun is at the center of our orbit. Having faith in evolution is like having faith that a certain man really is guilty of a crime when no one was there to see it and he left no trace at the scene (yes, I know there are traces left for one to postulate evolution, but no one can witness it in motion). If we then sentence that man to death based on "the best evidence we have," this is not good justice. I completely and thouroughly understand that science must go with what it has to work with, but we cannot call an unobservable phenomenon "certain".
Rrhain says I cannot say that you have "faith" in evolution because "that would be a lie." Is it? You (Rrhain) are certain that your unobservable phenomena is truth? Well, that to me sounds like religion. Everyone saying "Jesus is God" when not a single human being alive today could know, though to them the evidence seems real, concrete. Rrhain is a very religious scientific man, that is my conclusion.
What is observable in evolution theory can be accepted (finches, fish, and hummingbirds adapting to their environments), to say that life came from non-living matter and that humans came indirectly from bacteria, or what have you, and then calling this a certainty--this is bad science. Yet it is common practice. It may be true, but the chickens have not yet hatched...-Brian

No, the effects of gravity are witnessed. The effects of evolution are also witnessed. The theories of either are abstractions, and as such are not so witnessed. This is false. Evolution is presently observed in real time. Take a look at Rrhain's description of a common labratory experiment and other similar evidences in this post here. This is abiogenesis, for which there is no explanation as of yet. The only thing that is certain is that it happened.It is also irrelevant to the validity of evolutionary theory. You misunderstand science. It does not deal in absolute certainty. It only works on the best theory given the evidence. The theory is always subject to revision in light of new evidence. If you have a better theory that accounts for all of the available data and makes predictions that differentiate it from the maintstream theory and can be tested by experimental observation, please supply it.[This message has been edited by ::, 12-15-2003]