Easter Is Coming in 8 Weeks

Quote: FrGamble

"Why is the universe so impossibly fine tuned to support life as we know it?"

I have to ask - whatever do you mean?

I oftentimes wonder at the religious, especially because of their belief that we are somehow "special" and that God, creator of everything, somehow loves us the most.

Do you really understand the depth of our universe? The mote we call our solar system has 1 star and 9 planets (Pluto: Never Forget ;)) I won't even include all the asteroids and planetoids and minor planets and satellites that might potentially harbor life, which number in the tens of millions for just our solar system. We'll just talk the big stuff. Let's keep it simple (ha).

In just our galaxy alone, there are an estimated 400,000,000,000 stars. That's four hundred billion. Already, I'd wager that we are on a scale that you cannot comprehend. That is not a slight; I'd wager the majority, if not the entirety, of humanity cannot comprehend such a grand scale. We are just not made with that ability.

The modern thoughts in astronomy state that every sun has at least one planet, and that they average between 5 and 10, just like ours. Let's use 5 to keep the numbers low and make the math easy. So in our little neighborhood we call the Milky Way, there are an estimated 2,000,000,000,000 planets. That's two trillion.

But we haven't even scratched the surface. In only the observable universe, that is, in the stuff close enough to us that light has had the time (13+ billion years) to reach us, there are an estimated 170,000,000,000 of these galaxies. That's one hundred and seventy billion. So do the math. Go ahead, I'll wait...

By my count, that makes 136,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000 planets. That's one hundred and thirty six nonillion.

Can you grasp the scale here? The human body is comprised of ~100,000,000,000,000 cells. That's one hundred trillion. If each planet represented one human cell, how many people do you think we could build out of them? Ten? One thousand? One million?

No. If each planet represented a cell, we could recreated the entire population of Earth, all seven billion of us. Amazing, huh? Well, guess what? Not only could we recreate all 7 billion of us, we could recreate all seven billion of us twenty billion times over.

Can you see why I question religion after knowing this? If you say the universe is "finely tuned to support life", and we use us as a benchmark, then there is roughly a one in ten chance for other stars to have planets that support life. That would then mean that the numbers of other life forms out there are beyond imaginable, are unimaginable. And we're suppose to be "the favorite"? And how does all this other potential life even fit into Genesis?

Man, my mind is all jacked up now. In one of my favorite fictional stories, our hero, who for all intents and purposes was immortal, was almost stopped in his track by a wizard. Know how the wizard almost defeated him? He showed him everything. Everything. He allowed him to know the entire universe, and the depth of that knowledge nearly destroyed him. In talking about these numbers, I can understand why.

From a biological point of view, this God Favors Humans is absurd. Look at all the civilizations that collapsed, insects survived.

Nature has no preferences between a human being and a cockroach. Except possibly endowing the cockroach with the ability to survive higher radiation doses.

Quote: Nareed

I would love to see the observation that led to that conclusion.

Here we again encounter the limitations of science which can only speak of the observable universe. How can you observe or test that which existed before energy, space, or time? It is a philosophical impossibility. Surely you acknowledge the limits of scientific knowledge.

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Read my remark about open systems.

read my remark about science's limitations.

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So if my conscience dictates one thing and Jesus another, what do I do? I mean, I know what I'd do. What would you do?

You have to follow your conscience. This is why it is essential to form your conscience and listen to it. It is the place where God speaks to us in our innermost being. It is easy to silence this voice and confuse it with our feelings, desires, and wants. Only in silence, meditation and prayer can we truly listen to this inner voice. We also have to be courageous and completely open and honest and this is not easy to do. We have to silence the multitude of other voices that are much easier to hear. One of the sure ways to know it is not our truly our God given conscience if it is dictating anything to you, especially something contrary to Jesus' teaching. Our conscience, like God works with suggestion, encouragement, and love - it is the voice of God and therefore it always respects our freedom and does not command.

Quote: Evenbob

Religious people make these gigantic leaps
in logic and science, just to bolster their
position. A creator is 'obvious'? To who,
exactly. They do the same thing with sin,
it's supposedly obvious that sin is real.

Isn't it obvious that all energy, space, and time - our Universe - had to come from somewhere? Why is it obvious to you that the universe is eternal?

Isn't it obvious that human beings do awful things to one other? Isn't it obvious that there is evil in the world? Why is it so obvious to you that there is no problem with the human race?

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This drives me absolutely nuts.

What drives me nuts is hypocrisy and inconsistency and an unwillingness to subject ourselves to the same rigor and questions that we put to others.

Quote: Face

I have to ask - whatever do you mean?

I oftentimes wonder at the religious, especially because of their belief that we are somehow "special" and that God, creator of everything, somehow loves us the most.

Do you really understand the depth of our universe? The mote we call our solar system has 1 star and 9 planets (Pluto: Never Forget ;)) I won't even include all the asteroids and planetoids and minor planets and satellites that might potentially harbor life, which number in the tens of millions for just our solar system. We'll just talk the big stuff. Let's keep it simple (ha).

The anthropological principal answers some of the Father's objections. Dawkins covers this quite well in the God Delusion... even if in some other chapters he's a bit of a prig.

Quote: Nareed

As Barney Stinson likes to say "Challenge accepted."

These are the really good questions and answers that I love to talk about and I think we should spend more time discussing the mind blowing significance of. Like Face mentioned in another post this universe we live in is mind-boggling. What a joy it is to just sit back and let the awesomeness of our universe try to sink in! It is beyond us. Which is why it is crazy to reject outright the possibility of God.

Believing in God doesn't take away the wonder, on the contrary, it adds to it. Why do I believe so strongly in God then, why don't I just see Him as a possibility, like every thinking person should? Because I have an experience of Him. I don't know what lies outside of our observable universe anymore than you do, I don't know what life might exist outside of our own. However, I do know that God has revealed Himself to us in the person of Jesus Christ. He has shown us His love for us and for me, I've felt it, I live in it. I've seen it do wonders for me and countless others in my life. He is as real to me as you are, even more so. I wish I could explain this to you all better.

Regardless I believe one of the most important things we could ever do is to accept the challenge our lives in this universe present us with and answer these challenging questions like Nareed attempted to do. To ignore questions like: What will I do with my life? Does my life have meaning or purpose? How do we deal with our suffering or the suffering of others? How do we know right from wrong? Is there an objective morality we should live as human beings? and other big questions like these. This is not the stuff of science, but of religion, spirituality, or philosophy. This is what makes us different than all the animals and cockroaches of the world. To ignore them or refuse to wrestle with them is inhuman and in my opinion a huge failure.

Quote: FrGamble

What drives me nuts is hypocrisy and inconsistency and an unwillingness to subject ourselves to the same rigor and questions that we put to others.

What drives me nuts is assigning a supernatural cause to events which we do not understand.

Quote: Dalex64

What drives me nuts is assigning a supernatural cause to events which we do not understand.

Another thing that drive me nuts is assuming a supernatural cause cannot be the cause to events which we do not understand.

Quote: FrGamble

Regardless I believe one of the most important things we could ever do is to accept the challenge our lives in this universe present us with and answer these challenging questions like Nareed attempted to do. To ignore questions like: What will I do with my life? Does my life have meaning or purpose? How do we deal with our suffering or the suffering of others? How do we know right from wrong? Is there an objective morality we should live as human beings? and other big questions like these. This is not the stuff of science, but of religion, spirituality, or philosophy. This is what makes us different than all the animals and cockroaches of the world. To ignore them or refuse to wrestle with them is inhuman and in my opinion a huge failure.

If those are the questions of religion, then why do you keep trying to use religion to answer the questions of science?

Because people keep trying to use science to answer the questions of religion.