They're Made Out of Meat

Off Topic
21

[quote]lothario1132 wrote:
pookie wrote:
Hell, some of your physics teachers can’t tell the difference between conventional and nuclear weapons. :slight_smile:

OUCH!!! DUDE!!!

That hurt, man. Didn’t I tell you to stop picking on poor mertdawg already? :)[/quote]

Yeah, I know. I’ve got low willpower.

Yes, that’s true. Although what worries me is the low output of scientists and engineers from your schools. It used to be that american universities were world leaders in bleeding edge research; both in theoritical and practical applications. More and more Europe and Asia are ursupating that role. Even in your universities, a disproportionately large percentage of your brightest graduates are foreign students. Many elect to stay and work in the U.S., but many others go back home and “brain drain” you.

Considering that your defense budget dwarfs that of any other nation, you’d hope to have the best stuff.

Unfortunately, it’s not helping much in Iraq. Some situations don’t lend themselves well to simple annihilation. You can’t simply destroy all your problems. Infantry operations are still a pretty low tech affair.

Maybe when you get invisible, bullet-proof soldiers with 360 degrees radar vision, you’ll have more luck…?

It’s also worth considering what all those defense billions could buy you in R&D if you applied it (or some sizeable fraction of it) to medical research or space exploration or even to theoritical physics… Figuring out a way for every human on the planet to have clean drinking water cheaply would probably do more for the future of humanity AND for good will towards the U.S. than some invisible stealth bomber or nuclear sub that can vaporize any city in the world.

Better battery or fuel cell technology would accelerate the wireless revolution, would enable realistically usable electric cars; reducing your dependency on oil and possibly cleaning up the atmosphere…

The fusion reactor project that will be located in France is a good example of possible multi-national projects where the high costs (and eventual benefits) are shared by many nations. The U.S. taking a lead in such international undertakings would be a better way to spend those countless billions, IMO.

22

[quote]lothario1132 wrote:
“He who can destroy a thing, controls a thing.” -Paul Atreides from the book Dune, by Frank Herbert[/quote]

When you depend on that thing you can destroy for your life (ie. the earth), your control is mostly illusory.

23

[quote]pookie wrote:
Professor X wrote:
I have never believed that we are alone in the universe. I also don’t consider “us” as the quite so dominant species considering I believe in a creator. I understand that we are not the epitome of being so, therefore, the concept held by many that we are all there is happens to be what I was referring to.

That’s a pretty unusual combination. Do you believe the creator intended us to be, or did he just create a universe that had a potential for intelligent life and we (and maybe others) just happened?

[/quote]

This is A continuing question in the world. So imagine you take a dictionary blow it up into a bizillion peices and all the parts falling back together in perfest order. Theres just no way we just happaned. Were pretty complex meat.

working

24

[quote]Professor X wrote:
I don’t believe anything “just happens”.[/quote]

Is that in the sense of everything being pre-ordained? The initial act of Creation having been planned down to the least detail to ensure that we’d be here?

Or is it punctual interventions by the creator to “guide” cosmology and life formation/evolution?

25

[quote]WORKING wrote:
This is A continuing question in the world. So imagine you take a dictionary blow it up into a bizillion peices and all the parts falling back together in perfest order. Theres just no way we just happaned. Were pretty complex meat.[/quote]

Yes, but billions of years ago, there was no such complex meat. Most abiogenesis theories don’t propose complex life suddenly appearing spontaneously. What’s theorized is a long series of small, simple steps eventually leading to simple self-replicators and from those, to more complex life.

Your dictionnary example is no good because a dictionnary contains no system allowing for self-repair and replication. It is not a living thing. Theories about spontaneous formation of life, or of life’s pre-requisite chemicals does not depend on pure random chance either. The laws of nature ordain that some atoms will assemble themselves in some way and not some other. In other words, there is already “order” in the universe, in the form of its physical laws. Just as crystals and snowflakes will “order” themselves according to natural law, it is possible to envision the same laws favorising the eventual formation of life.

26

[quote]Zap Branigan wrote:
pookie wrote:
Gee, you guys are pretty hard on those poor meats.

Just beating their meat.[/quote]

Taste like chicken

27

The point of the dictionary is that thers no way it could just happen on its own. Something had to set up that order in the universe the chances of evolution has no evidence to support it
the theory of neanderthal man is based on twenty eight bones put together from diferrent locations.

for me its a matter of faith and believing that the bible is the inspired word of god were we are told that god created man in his image out of the dust of the grown and breathed the breath of life onto his nostrils. I do respect the evolotionist opinion to me it just makes no sense.

28

[quote]WORKING wrote:
The point of the dictionary is that thers no way it could just happen on its own.[/quote]

Couldn’t the Creator make a universe where it is possible for life to appear and evolve on it’s own?

[quote]Something had to set up that order in the universe the chances of evolution has no evidence to support it
the theory of neanderthal man is based on twenty eight bones put together from diferrent locations. [/quote]

You’re mixing cosmology and paleontology here. Whether the universe was created or not has little relation with the Neanderthal man.

The are a lot more bones from dinosaurs, which are not mentioned in the Bible… it gets to a point where it’s hard to discount the physical evidence.

Maybe it’s just a question of taking the words in too literal a sense. To me, those creation myths are simply too prosaic and show the lack of knowledge about the universe that was the reality when they were written down.

29

IMO, the example with the dictionary is misleading. In the given context, the question should rather be: Is it possible, in the whole space-time continuum in which we exist, for self aware consciousness to evolve independently and by chance?

30

[quote]pookie wrote:
WORKING wrote:
The point of the dictionary is that thers no way it could just happen on its own.

Couldn’t the Creator make a universe where it is possible for life to appear and evolve on it’s own?[/quote]

I guess you beat me on commenting on that particular sentence. Oh well, the spirit is willing but the meat is weak…

31

[quote]michael2507 wrote:
IMO, the example with the dictionary is misleading. In the given context, the question should rather be: Is it possible, in the whole space-time continuum in which we exist, for self aware consciousness to evolve independently and by chance? [/quote]

Even if it wasn’t, by positing a creator you’re simply compounding the problem by assuming we were created by an entity which would have to be infinitely more complex than we are. Then you have to ask the question, what gave rise to this being?

32

[quote]Orbitalboner wrote:
michael2507 wrote:
IMO, the example with the dictionary is misleading. In the given context, the question should rather be: Is it possible, in the whole space-time continuum in which we exist, for self aware consciousness to evolve independently and by chance?

Even if it wasn’t, by positing a creator you’re simply compounding the problem by assuming we were created by an entity which would have to be infinitely more complex than we are. Then you have to ask the question, what gave rise to this being?[/quote]

No you don’t. You are being simplistic when thinking that anything that much more complex than we are would even need a beginning or need to live within any context of “time” that we would be familiar with or able to understand.

33

[quote]pookie wrote:
Professor X wrote:
I don’t believe anything “just happens”.

Is that in the sense of everything being pre-ordained? The initial act of Creation having been planned down to the least detail to ensure that we’d be here?

Or is it punctual interventions by the creator to “guide” cosmology and life formation/evolution?[/quote]

It is in the sense that in a universe governed by time, all we still have is the ability to choose. For instance, I could write a “choose your own adventure” book. Sure, you may choose to take the most negative course in that book and meet a negative end, but it isn’t like I didn’t also write a very positive ending for the person who made a different choice.

34

[quote]Professor X wrote:

No you don’t. You are being simplistic when thinking that anything that much more complex than we are would even need a beginning or need to live within any context of “time” that we would be familiar with or able to understand.[/quote]

Ah, sorry for taking the simplistic route, I should have taken the super complex route by saying “It’s all too difficult for us to understand anyway”.

35

[quote]Orbitalboner wrote:
Professor X wrote:

No you don’t. You are being simplistic when thinking that anything that much more complex than we are would even need a beginning or need to live within any context of “time” that we would be familiar with or able to understand.

Ah, sorry for taking the simplistic route, I should have taken the super complex route by saying “It’s all too difficult for us to understand anyway”.[/quote]

That wasn’t meant to insult you. Honestly, you think it is impossible that there is something above us that complex? If so, then what I stated in my very first post in this thread is correct. You want to limit the abilities of “God” by thinking “he” has to follow the laws of our reality. I suppose that is the only way you can mentally avoid giving any power at all to him.

36

[quote]Professor X wrote:
It is in the sense that in a universe governed by time, all we still have is the ability to choose. For instance, I could write a “choose your own adventure” book. Sure, you may choose to take the most negative course in that book and meet a negative end, but it isn’t like I didn’t also write a very positive ending for the person who made a different choice.[/quote]

Before man appeared on the planet, who/what was making the choices? Was it random chance? A guiding hand? Was it inevitably, given the laws of nature and enough time, that intelligent, conscious life would evolve somewhere?

And about the ability to choose, if those choices led to the destruction of all life on the planet (major nuclear war, runaway global warming, asteroid impact, rogue bioweapon, etc), do you think the Creator would intervene to prevent it? Or simply see to it that those choices never happen? In which case, are we really free to choose?

37

[quote]pookie wrote:
Before man appeared on the planet, who/what was making the choices? Was it random chance? A guiding hand? Was it inevitably, given the laws of nature and enough time, that intelligent, conscious life would evolve somewhere?[/quote]

Are you truly asking all of these questions because you really want to understand, or in an attempt to discredit what I believe? Obviously, for someone who believes in God, God would be who created the planet and all life on it before man walked on it. Did you truly not understand or know that? I seriously doubt that.

[quote]
And about the ability to choose, if those choices led to the destruction of all life on the planet (major nuclear war, runaway global warming, asteroid impact, rogue bioweapon, etc), do you think the Creator would intervene to prevent it? Or simply see to it that those choices never happen? In which case, are we really free to choose?[/quote]

Again, for those who believe in God, this world is already destined to be destroyed. Are you really this unfamiliar with the concept of God? I really want to know.

38

[quote]Professor X wrote:
That wasn’t meant to insult you. Honestly, you think it is impossible that there is something above us that complex? If so, then what I stated in my very first post in this thread is correct. You want to limit the abilities of “God” by thinking “he” has to follow the laws of our reality. I suppose that is the only way you can mentally avoid giving any power at all to him.[/quote]

I don’t think it’s impossible that there is something more complex than us, but I think the likelihood we were created by an omni-present, omni-potent being is even less likely than the possibility we were created by aliens.

Also, I try not to assign too much power to beings whose existence is questionable at best, although I’ll admit that God as a concept has wielded tremendous power in the history of mankind, and has almost certainly been beneficial to our cognitive evolution.

39

[quote]Professor X wrote:
Orbitalboner wrote:
michael2507 wrote:
IMO, the example with the dictionary is misleading. In the given context, the question should rather be: Is it possible, in the whole space-time continuum in which we exist, for self aware consciousness to evolve independently and by chance?

Even if it wasn’t, by positing a creator you’re simply compounding the problem by assuming we were created by an entity which would have to be infinitely more complex than we are. Then you have to ask the question, what gave rise to this being?

No you don’t. You are being simplistic when thinking that anything that much more complex than we are would even need a beginning or need to live within any context of “time” that we would be familiar with or able to understand.[/quote]

God tells us he is the alpha and the omega the beginning and the end before he created it there was only him. Now if you had a freind who always told you the truth thousands and thousands of times which the bible does the fall of Jeruselum was predicted hudreds of years earlier by Danial and Isiah.

the rise and fall of Alexander the great and the division of his empire to for generals. The fall of babylon was foretold also. Which all is supported by secular hx and archeological evidence. for example science stated that the city of Nineveh mentioned in the bible never existed, then the wind started blowing and hey theres this great big city with the library intact
hey it it was the the city of Ninevah.

So the question remains if someone was always truthful with you would you one day decidse that they were lying to you.

40

[quote]Orbitalboner wrote:
Professor X wrote:
That wasn’t meant to insult you. Honestly, you think it is impossible that there is something above us that complex? If so, then what I stated in my very first post in this thread is correct. You want to limit the abilities of “God” by thinking “he” has to follow the laws of our reality. I suppose that is the only way you can mentally avoid giving any power at all to him.

I don’t think it’s impossible that there is something more complex than us, but I think the likelihood we were created by an omni-present, omni-potent being is even less likely than the possibility we were created by aliens.

Also, I try not to assign too much power to beings whose existence is questionable at best, although I’ll admit that God as a concept has wielded tremendous power in the history of mankind, and has almost certainly been beneficial to our cognitive evolution.[/quote]

…And that is your right and your choice to believe that. No one has written otherwise.