Original Sin?

Quote: FrGamble

Anyway the point of that scene is what happens when science tries to get at things like poetry. It makes it cold and dead, like Face attempted to do equating love to drugs. Believing that the only things that are real are the things science can get at is to borrow a phrase, "excrement".

I'm sorry you feel that way, but it doesn't change the truth. I'm actually surprised at the level of resistance over what is relatively basic biological science.

EB's love of his dog, for example. The same hormones, oxytocin and seratonin, are released in the petting, grooming, and caring for Rover as they do for lil Billy. It's the exact same biological process at play. Hunger, same thing. Leptin (?) and gherlin (?) regulate those feelings. One is released by fat build up, making you stop when full. Many of those who are overweight have built up tolerances to this chemical, resulting in them eating past full. "Cravings" are your body's natural drive to get what it wants. Low on zinc? You'll crave seafood. Low on potassium? You'll crave a banana. And others you'll desire simply for the release of those same feel good hormones dopamine and seratonin. Chocolate cake, booze, lemon meringue pie. Even my extreme nature is all the result of these naturally occurring chemicals. Every 100mph wheelie I did and every 40' jump I completed caused a surge of adrenaline and dopamine. It feels good. So I search for it over and over again, and wheelies get bumped up to 140mph, and jumps up to 80', all in the search of more and bigger highs.

As I said, facts ain't sexy. They just are. I've been there. I've experienced what damage and disruption to those chemical pumps and receptors does. One period was when I burned them out with drug use. Another, from trauma. And without the transfer and reception of those "drugs", the hormones your body produces, love Does Not Exist. When my mother, the most beautiful human on the planet, cried for the pain I was in, I knew I loved her. I knew I hurt for her. But I felt nothing. Not because I was cold, or heartless, or sociopathic. I just damaged the receptors that cause love. Without the reception of that hormone, love does not exist.

I told OG in his sleep blog that death does not compare to the terror of losing one's mind. I meant it. I've been there. "Cold and dead" wasn't my "idea", it was me. And it is the most miserable thing I could imagine anyone experiencing. But it had nothing to do with my upbringing, my beliefs, my personality, or how I view life. All it was was shutting down that chemical that gives life it's luster.

Without somatroptin, your body does not grow. Without melatonin, you do not sleep. Without testosterone, you have no sexual drive. Without triiodothyronine, you have no metabolism. And without oxytocin, you have no love. It's not a belief or a philosophy. It's simple biological fact.

Quote: Face

. EB's love of his dog, for example. The same hormones,

Only to a point. Most of the time love
comes from familiarity and friendship.
I depend on him, he depends on me.
We're attached to each other.

Quote: Face

I'm sorry you feel that way, but it doesn't change the truth. I'm actually surprised at the level of resistance over what is relatively basic biological science

Are you familiar with the pathetic fallacy? It consists in giving human qualities or desires to non-human beings or objects. Like saying when two concentrations of matter, for example, are in close proximity to each other, they "want" to move closer together.

Science made great strides more quickly once the Natural Philosophers rid themselves of this fallacy, when they stopped, really, trying to find motivations in objects.

There is one current of thought in science which more or less tries to do away with human motivations when studying human beings. While this would work for basic biological processes, after all your liver doesn't "want" anything, it fails when considering a human being or a human mind.

To be sure biochemical processes affect behavior. But you cannot reduce human actions and desires to biochemistry alone, nor "fix" any and all problems with drugs.

Quote: FrGamble

nothing is important and nothing matters.

In fact, that's it exactly. No one thing is
more important than any other one thing.
You are the one who makes it important.

You make up your mind as to what's important,
the universe has no opinion. Save someone
from the building or don't save them, it's
your decision.

So you want me to invent a god like you do
so he can tell me I'm more special than a bug,
when it's obviously not true. Listen to what
you're saying. You have a god because your
ego needs one. Having a god makes you feel
good. God is a drug, just as addictive as heroin.

No thanks, don't need it, I hate addictions. They
cloud the mind.

Quote: Evenbob

Save someone
from the building or don't save them, it's
your decision.

listen to what you are saying here please!

Quote:

So you want me to invent a god like you do
so he can tell me I'm more special than a bug,
when it's obviously not true.

Why do you say this? Can you show me one fact or proof to support you, I've given you many that you never respond to.

Quote:

Listen to what
you're saying. You have a god because your
ego needs one. Having a god makes you feel
good.

Listen to what you are saying you hypocritical blankity blank. You have been railing on me for days previous about how Catholicism is all about making people feel guilty and how sinful they are, blah, blah, blah. Now you say that we need a God to make us feel good and that it is like an addictive drug. What are you smoking?

This is like you consistently demanding some type of impossible scientific proof for the existence of God before you believe and then you go on to proclaim your belief that matter is eternal and the we are all part of the universe and all equal and other pantheistic thoughts that have no proof or even evidence to support them. Aughhh!

Quote: Nareed

Can you point the error in my assumptions? Did not simple particles form atoms, then atoms form stars and planets and animals?

The error is in you assuming these simple particles are the designers or planners of this progression or that such things can happen without a plan or design.

Quote:

We've seen simple components organize naturally into complex structures. We can recreate such things in the lab (Urey et al.) We have proof of it, in other words. Would you care to offer any proof of your position?

It is exciting to study how the building blocks of life may have come about but lets not forget the bigger question is why does this happen, what set of natural laws and cosmochemistry have to be in place for this to work? What you are observing in this progression is the steps of building a complex organism from simper material, not simpler organisms or particles somehow creating on their own something more complex.

Quote: FrGamble

listen to what you are saying here please!

If it's not my choice, who's choice is it.

Quote:

You have been railing on me for days previous about how Catholicism is all about making people feel guilty and how sinful they are, blah, blah, blah. Now you say that we need a God to make us feel good

Indeed you do. Part of the 'feeling good' is
is having a strict 'parent' god watching your
every move, making you feel special. You're
so adored by him he even wants you to go and
confess what's bothering you to one of his
representatives. I would certainly feel cared
for by a cult that paid so much attention to
me. If I needed that kind of thing, that is.

Quote:

that have no proof or even evidence to support them.

Examples are easy enough to give. One
parent has two jobs to support the kids
he has custody of. He chooses to work
12 hours a day to provide for them.
Another parent has a drinking problem
and decides to give in to his addiction
rather than make a good living for his
kids.

They both made decisions on what is
most important to them, there is no
outside universal force telling them
what to do. No one thing is more
important that any other one thing.
We decide what's important and what
isn't and live with the results.

The things that were of the utmost
importance to me 40 years are now
not important in the least. What this
tells me is that they were never important
to begin with unless I made them so. It
tells me I create my own reality by the
decisions I make or don't make, it doesn't
come from the outside. The universe
doesn't care one way or another, why
would it.

Quote: Evenbob

Examples are easy enough to give. One
parent has two jobs to support the kids
he has custody of. He chooses to work
12 hours a day to provide for them.
Another parent has a drinking problem
and decides to give in to his addiction
rather than make a good living for his
kids.
They both made decisions on what is
most important to them, there is no
outside universal force telling them
what to do.

Are you trying to say that there is no real moral difference between what these two parents chose to do? That it is just as morally right and good for someone to selfish drink themselves to death while their kids starve as long as they think drinking is more important? Please say it's not so, Bob, please.

Quote:

The things that were of the utmost
importance to me 40 years are now
not important in the least. What this
tells me is that they were never important
to begin with unless I made them so.

Could it also possibly be that like most people when we are younger our priorities are often screwed up?

Quote:

It tells me I create my own reality by the
decisions I make or don't make, it doesn't
come from the outside. The universe
doesn't care one way or another, why
would it.

I hate to say it but you sound like HotBlonde. Please stop the craziness.

Quote: FrGamble

Are you trying to say that there is no real moral difference

Whoa there, Nellie. Where do morals come
into this. The universe has no morals, they
are man made. We make up morals because
no one thing is more important than any
other one thing. A person can be moral or
immoral, it's completely up to them. The
universe is neutral on the matter.

Quote:

Could it also possibly be that like most people when we are younger our priorities are often screwed up?

Why do you think people in their 50's
don't have screwed up priorities too. No,
nothing is important unless we make
it so. It's a sobering thought to realize
that a lot what's important to you now
won't mean jack to you 10 years from
now. We create our reality by the decisions
we make about what's important to us.
But it's a moving line, nothing stands still
for long.

Quote:

Please stop the craziness.

Not a bit of it is crazy, not the tiniest
part. You've locked yourself into a
closed system that tells you what to
do, what to say, and what to think,
for the most part. It's a comfortable
way of life, that's why some men are
drawn to it. All your questions have
been answered, your needs will be
taken care of for the rest of your life
if you just play by the rules.

I understand completely where you're
coming from.

Quote: Evenbob

A person can be moral or
immoral, it's completely up to them. The
universe is neutral on the matter.

So the universe doesn't care if you rape and kill little children? Whether such things are moral or immoral is completely up to person who decides if it is important to protect little children or not? The universe is neutral on the matter? I'm sorry to say this but that is one fucked up universe and it is not the universe I live in, nor would I want to, nor would any sane person. I'm done, I'm sorry.