"There is no heaven; it's a fairy story"

[NobleGuy]

IainT said:

NobleGuy said:

If it is a reality it won't be in our lifetime, so from a purely selfish way it makes no difference to me.

But it will improve during your and my lifetimes. That something will tame time, effort and willpower should not mean it's not something worth working towards.

NobleGuy said:

You're making a big assumption that if people were given choice then they'd stop reproducing...and how do medical advances limit population? They appear to concentrate on prolonging life...

Population, birth rates and life expectancy are intrinsically linked of course but birth rate and infant mortality are the biggest factor. If you search out the data projecting global population with current development it will peak then fall back significantly to, IIRC, 4-5bn. The assumption is that developing nations start to place more import on quality of life, leisure, etc than on basic survival. Infant mortality rates and their improvement are one of the major factors in the recent explosion of population in developing nations.

I'm not convinced that projection will come to fruition.

[IainT]

NobleGuy said:

IainT said:

NobleGuy said:

If it is a reality it won't be in our lifetime, so from a purely selfish way it makes no difference to me.

But it will improve during your and my lifetimes. That something will tame time, effort and willpower should not mean it's not something worth working towards.

NobleGuy said:

You're making a big assumption that if people were given choice then they'd stop reproducing...and how do medical advances limit population? They appear to concentrate on prolonging life...

Population, birth rates and life expectancy are intrinsically linked of course but birth rate and infant mortality are the biggest factor. If you search out the data projecting global population with current development it will peak then fall back significantly to, IIRC, 4-5bn. The assumption is that developing nations start to place more import on quality of life, leisure, etc than on basic survival. Infant mortality rates and their improvement are one of the major factors in the recent explosion of population in developing nations.

I'm not convinced that projection will come to fruition.

Well, that's always a possibility and I don;t know enough about that field to really comment beyond repeating that it's the current thinking. It's the UN though and I would ahve thought it more in line with their mandate to be pushing a population scare scenario rather than one where there is light at the end of the tunnel.

Of course the models used will be based on lots of assumptions about continued development and the trend in quality of life continuing to improve globally as it has for the last 150 years. Wars, pandemics, fuel will all have great bearing on them.

[fluffnik]

ChrisGB said:

How does one become a consenting adult? One doesn't just arrive there. If a society has significant numbers of consenting adults who choose to enter into suicide pacts, this will come to be considered a norm and will be tolerated in law, but it is still going to have a huge and negative effect on society in almost any way you want to consider it. Once something is legal, it becomes morally acceptable. If consent is the ultimate criterion in morality, you will have no problem on any level with your loved ones dying in a suicide pact.

Autonomous beings live for themselves. That's just how it is.

I would be utterly gutted if loved ones died in a suicide pact but their autonomy is theirs.

I'd be sad but supportive if someone close to me felt their life had become or was in the process of becoming intolerable decided to take control of their mortality.

The legality of suicide has little or no influence on its occurrence though I suspect atheists who are not suffering a degenerative or painfully terminal influence are likely to have a lower rate.

I have a problem with suicides who chuck themselves under trains or otherwise involve non-consenting participants - I have abiding memories of a vomiting train driver being supported by two Gendarmes at the trackside after someone had chucked themselves under our train...

ChrisGB said:

fluffnik said:

Why should churches have any say in civil marriage?

Is this the liberal saying who can and can't voice opinions in public?

No.

Expressing opinions is fine, attempting to drive legislation to constrain the liberties of the unaffiliated is totalitarian.

Faithful Catholics will not seek gay marriage or (assisted) suicide in the face of illness, no-one else has any duty to follow Church doctrine and should not have it foisted upon them.

[Jabbah]

NobleGuy said:

You're making a big assumption that if people were given choice then they'd stop reproducing

No, I'm not. What is clearly visible from current statistics is that people chose to have less children (ie 1 or 2 in modern countries) as infant mortality rates decrease and quality of life increases.

NobleGuy said:

and how do medical advances limit population? They appear to concentrate on prolonging life...

Yes they concentrate on preserving and prolonging life. The side effect of this is that couples choose to have children later age and with a much lower chance of the child dying also choose to have less children hence limiting population growth.

Your seeming inability to grasp such concepts is strange. Especially as it has deflected discussion away from which type of society you would prefer to see or deem to be less evil.

[fluffnik]

mattnunn said:

We are within? My apple is within my butty box, it is not a part of my butty box, it is seperate.

The question is whether my butty box necessitates my apple or my apple necessitates my butty box.

The Universe is neither the apple nor the butty box, it's the whole packed lunch.

[mattnunn]

TheHeretic said:

mattnunn said:

Well that's all very well and fine, I don't know why you're avoiding the clue.

What is the aim of science if not to model the universe, explain it's happenstance?

What does that have to do with anything, and why are failing to make your definitions?

Well it's the same aim as religion, and philosophy, science has a larger, better defined vocabulary, but at each turn we're limited by the language we have at our disposal, the tools at our finger tips.

It's true religion is an archaic language, but so is latin and science (well biology) insist on using that!

So all your quarks, taus and bosons will only fill in the blanks to qestions asked for millenia. That's not to say one shouldn't try, just to appreciate, your treading in the footsteps of cavemen, it's just your vocab is better.

For full enlightment, as Plato suggested, turn away from the cave wall, see reality for what it is, not the flickering shadows of yesteryear.

[TheHeretic]

mattnunn said:

Well it's the same aim as religion, and philosophy, science has a larger, better defined vocabulary, but at each turn we're limited by the language we have at our disposal, the tools at our finger tips.

It's true religion is an archaic language, but so is latin and science (well biology) insist on using that!

So all your quarks, taus and bosons will only fill in the blanks to qestions asked for millenia. That's not to say one shouldn't try, just to appreciate, your treading in the footsteps of cavemen, it's just your vocab is better.

For full enlightment, as Plato suggested, turn away from the cave wall, see reality for what it is, not the flickering shadows of yesteryear.

Blah blah. Not interested until you make clear your definitions. Still waiting, and have asked repeatedly. Unsurprisingly you seem reticent to answer.

[mattnunn]

TheHeretic said:

mattnunn said:

Well it's the same aim as religion, and philosophy, science has a larger, better defined vocabulary, but at each turn we're limited by the language we have at our disposal, the tools at our finger tips.

It's true religion is an archaic language, but so is latin and science (well biology) insist on using that!

So all your quarks, taus and bosons will only fill in the blanks to qestions asked for millenia. That's not to say one shouldn't try, just to appreciate, your treading in the footsteps of cavemen, it's just your vocab is better.

For full enlightment, as Plato suggested, turn away from the cave wall, see reality for what it is, not the flickering shadows of yesteryear.

Blah blah. Not interested until you make clear your definitions. Still waiting, and have asked repeatedly. Unsurprisingly you seem reticent to answer.

I agree with your definitions, if you like, they are the definitions, this is exactly what I'm talking about, we have a dictionary - for reference untill it changes.

Back to satre, existence preceeds essence. As you so able demonstrate - we are hooked on describing and explaining existence so as we may be at peace with life, reality, nature - whatever you wish to call it. i'd say stop that right now, leave the cave, no enlightment will be found that way.

[TheHeretic]

mattnunn said:

I agree with your definitions, if you like, they are the definitions, this is exactly what I'm talking about, we have a dictionary - for reference untill it changes.

Back to satre, existence preceeds essence. As you so able demonstrate - we are hooked on describing and explaining existence so as we may be at peace with life, reality, nature - whatever you wish to call it. i'd say stop that right now, leave the cave, no enlightment will be found that way.

Finally. So you agree with my definition? Great, so your assertion from so many pages ago that the universe and humanity are separate has been debunked? Great. Thought so.

We are obsessed with finding answers about all sorts of things. Physics, biology,mchemistry, electromagnetism, and all the rest of it. We are happy with patterns. You seem to think that this quest for scientific knowledge is some sort of entrapping cave? Can you tell us where to find enlightenment, (and indeed, tell us what this enlightenment consists of).

[fluffnik]

ChrisGB said:

fluffnik said:

ChrisGB said:

Something done solely for pleasure is disordered

Why?

Purely for pleasure:

Some argument about uncontrolled immoderation there, still don't see any problem with hedonistic pleasure...

[fluffnik]

mattnunn said:

For full enlightment, as Plato suggested, turn away from the cave wall, see reality for what it is, not the flickering shadows of yesteryear.

That sounds a bit like applying the scientific method.

[NobleGuy]

Jabbah said:

NobleGuy said:

You're making a big assumption that if people were given choice then they'd stop reproducing

No, I'm not. What is clearly visible from current statistics is that people chose to have less children (ie 1 or 2 in modern countries) as infant mortality rates decrease and quality of life increases.

NobleGuy said:

and how do medical advances limit population? They appear to concentrate on prolonging life...

Yes they concentrate on preserving and prolonging life. The side effect of this is that couples choose to have children later age and with a much lower chance of the child dying also choose to have less children hence limiting population growth.

Your seeming inability to grasp such concepts is strange. Especially as it has deflected discussion away from which type of society you would prefer to see or deem to be less evil.

It's not an inability, it's simply questioning whether what we see happening in the West is what would happen in Africa or in China or India. It may, it may not we simply don't know. And whatever happens is going to happen way after we're all gone.

As for what society I prefer... If you want an honest answer I don't have a view either way. I suppose less suffering is good, but then I don't lie awake at night worrying about it perhaps because I'm spoiled being a Westerner.

[fluffnik]

ChrisGB said:

fluffnik said:

1. All the arguments against magic hydras and wicker bulls are equally valid against any other supernatural entity that acts in the natural world.

2. We cannot dismiss, nor confirm, a deist creator but we can quite reasonably dismiss every interventionist deity so far posited.

3. Sadly it is quite difficult or even impossible to point out to someone, even showing the working, that their world view is delusional nonsense without risking upset.

4. You may have noticed that I often allow that my inability to differentiate religious faith in the supernatural or spiritual from and any other delusion may be a failing on my part.

Sorry to cut and paste, and to be clear, my reply to your recreation yesterday was to a general you / one, not to you as sir fluffnik.
1. But what is a wicker bull? When we say that the universe needs a cause that is not of the universe, how can the words "wicker bull" mean that?

There are countless creation myths many of which feature a creator.

Many of those supposed creators are modelled upon living things.

I was not the first to mention a wicker bull or magic hydra and I don't know if they have any history outwith this thread. There here as examples of equivalent improbability mostly.

There is currently no satisfactory for the First Cause issue, gods are every bit as in need of a First Cause as the observable Universe.

ChrisGB said:

2. I believe in an interventionist deity but I have not seen such dismissed, I have been consistently told that people who attack my religion, and every thread without exception on PH where I have contributed on religion is where religion is being attacked, have nothing to prove, and that we people of religion are making the mad claims. You though have just made a claim, so...?

Insofar as interventionist deities(' supporters(!)) make unfalsifiable claims they are largely as (in)credible as the deist creator, however some of their claims are falsifiable and have indeed been falsified every time they have been tested.

You can remove gods from the system and nothing changes.

ChrisGB said:

3. Absolutely, hence my old and tongue in cheek "there is no belief more irrational than that the natural is all there is", since there could not possibly be evidence for this belief, and "evidence" in a narrowly scientific-discourse way would be required. It may be the case, but evidence is impossible.

I don't see anything irrational about considering the natural Universe to be the whole enchilada, indeed I can see no rational reason for thinking there might be anything else.

Oh, Aquinas's proofs are anything but. I don't think it's entirely unreasonable to summarise them in the style of Slashdot thus:

stuuf

???

God!

ChrisGB said:

4. You do not come across as treating theists as delusional, on the contrary. I am not a sympathetic person, but I do get that any talk of the "non-natural" or "beyond nature" is so bizarre for some that they instinctively assume it can't refer to anything. I don't think they are deluded, but they have a more limited / limiting worldview. This is why I have characterised the decline of religious values in West not just as moral collapse but also as imaginative collapse.

I'm entirely willing to entertain the possibility that theists just might not be delusional and that it might be my failing that I lack the credulity required for faith.

I don't think there's anything lacking or limited in my gloriously godless and entirely natural Universe.

[ChrisGB]

fluffnik said:

ChrisGB said:

How does one become a consenting adult? One doesn't just arrive there. If a society has significant numbers of consenting adults who choose to enter into suicide pacts, this will come to be considered a norm and will be tolerated in law, but it is still going to have a huge and negative effect on society in almost any way you want to consider it. Once something is legal, it becomes morally acceptable. If consent is the ultimate criterion in morality, you will have no problem on any level with your loved ones dying in a suicide pact.

Autonomous beings live for themselves. That's just how it is.

I would be utterly gutted if loved ones died in a suicide pact but their autonomy is theirs.

I'd be sad but supportive if someone close to me felt their life had become or was in the process of becoming intolerable decided to take control of their mortality.

The legality of suicide has little or no influence on its occurrence though I suspect atheists who are not suffering a degenerative or painfully terminal influence are likely to have a lower rate.

I have a problem with suicides who chuck themselves under trains or otherwise involve non-consenting participants - I have abiding memories of a vomiting train driver being supported by two Gendarmes at the trackside after someone had chucked themselves under our train...

ChrisGB said:

fluffnik said:

Why should churches have any say in civil marriage?

Is this the liberal saying who can and can't voice opinions in public?

No.

Expressing opinions is fine, attempting to drive legislation to constrain the liberties of the unaffiliated is totalitarian.

Faithful Catholics will not seek gay marriage or (assisted) suicide in the face of illness, no-one else has any duty to follow Church doctrine and should not have it foisted upon them.

It would seem to me a very odd scene if these loved ones were telling you they were going to die in a suicide pact and you just sitting there nodding saying I am gutted but it's your choice. A doctrine of total non-interference would be indistinguishable from a doctrine of total neglect.

So a doctrine or law that forbids say men from having several wives in order to protect the equality and dignity of women is in fact me forcing my views through legislation? Can there ever be a sense in which legislation is not somebody's view? Forcing through legislation for assisted suicide affects everyone, because it then becomes the norm in society that what is legal becomes what is morally acceptable, and so life is cheapened. We as a culture now say that a life where there is pain is not worth living as much as a life without pain. A doctor who previously swore to heal must now be almost prepared to kill.

Once the idea that life is sacred is abandoned, what makes any life worth protecting? Once people are encouraged to view themselves as burdens, they will take a logical next step and seek to remove themselves as burdens. We will be saying as a society, in fact I think we are already saying it, that people should not be a burden on others. There is something immoral about making others need to look after you physically or financially.
Now this is just the happy life turned on its head. Happiness in this scenario is the secure knowledge that my loved ones are willing and ready to do all they can for me, and that by doing that they will learn what love is. This is what the Bible says - when Jesus is asked if a person with a handicap has that handicap because his parents have sinned, Jesus says no, but so that the glory of God can be revealed - in other words the true love that would be daily care or provision of daily care is a beautiful thing, and assisted suicide / old people as a burden etc is a road to dealing with people as objects for one's own convenience, not as a way for them to know they are loved and you to learn love.

[TheHeretic]

ChrisGB said:

This is what the Bible says - when Jesus is asked if a person with a handicap has that handicap because his parents have sinned, Jesus says no, but so that the glory of God can be revealed - in other words the true love that would be daily care or provision of daily care is a beautiful thing, and assisted suicide / old people as a burden etc is a road to dealing with people as objects for one's own convenience, not as a way for them to know they are loved and you to learn love.

And you think that makes perfect sense? Rather than do anything, somehow the suffering millions go through is so that the glory of God can be revealed?

"Hi, I'm going to shoot you in the spine, that way you will be able to glory in the love, and care of the people around you as they nurse you to health, and look after you for the rest of your days, that I have given you by shooting you in the spines. I am nice like that."

[IainT]

TheHeretic said:

ChrisGB said:

This is what the Bible says - when Jesus is asked if a person with a handicap has that handicap because his parents have sinned, Jesus says no, but so that the glory of God can be revealed - in other words the true love that would be daily care or provision of daily care is a beautiful thing, and assisted suicide / old people as a burden etc is a road to dealing with people as objects for one's own convenience, not as a way for them to know they are loved and you to learn love.

And you think that makes perfect sense? Rather than do anything, somehow the suffering millions go through is so that the glory of God can be revealed?

"Hi, I'm going to shoot you in the spine, that way you will be able to glory in the love, and care of the people around you as they nurse you to health, and look after you for the rest of your days, that I have given you by shooting you in the spines. I am nice like that."

You jest but there are many cults and sects than mainstream Christianity is very quick to distance itself from that would see such logic and applaud it.

[IainT]

mattnunn said:

And you see, religion, science and philosophy...

[snip]

You'll have to mull all three before getting close to holding an opinion worthy of note.

Missed this little gem before, thanks for giving me something to smile at. To condescend from your position is quite impressive.

Let me detail my key objections:

1) You assume that I am not aware of anything outside the scientific and have given no thought to religion or philosophy.
I certainly place a great deal of import to science (and by this I mean the real, tangible world). It feeds me, keeps me warm and makes the porn arrive on the internet. Religion is something I have more than a passing experience of and have studied and rejected. Philosophy... "the rational investigation of the truths and principles of being, knowledge, or conduct." at no point can this contradict the realities of the universe and certainly cannot create proofs that contradict the nature of the universe as shown by science.

2) You assume I have any interest in having a noteworthy opinion or that it has any effect on my that someone would value my views.
It may pass some time to share them and discuss them and it's certainly interesting to do so but I'm not bothered on jot who takes not or not. Contrary to assertions on this thread it's not about winning, it's about how you play the game.

[interloper]

ChrisGB said:

It would seem to me a very odd scene if these loved ones were telling you they were going to die in a suicide pact and you just sitting there nodding saying I am gutted but it's your choice.

But that's just it, its personal choice, sure I would try and persuade, cajole and lightly arm twist them not to...... Ultimately its got to be down to the individual.

I have followed this thread for quite a while, frankly amazed it hasn't descended into something messy and wound up locked. Hell I guess there is still time for that!

To my view the church and in particular the Catholic church has such a hold over people because there has been such an investment of time and money in these institutions. They will point out how old they are, how they are fonts of knowledge, how they do lots of charity work and look after the poor and the sick, etc etc. And people are suckled in by the enormity of it all.

Its an industry, a monster and its all based on a bedrock of old rather improbable tales, traditions, dogma and yet somehow keeps going.....

Oddly I have also noticed with the events of 9/11 and the more publicly noticeable side of Islamic extremism seems to have lead to Christians being more vocal, especially the more evangelical. I feel this has almost forced the hand of us quiet Atheists/Infidels, opening your mouth and saying that religion is nonesense or woo shouldn't be seen as offensive, its just the truth as I see it.

[ChrisGB]

bikemonster said:

ChrisGB said:

The God of Christianity can and does interact with reality. Take the Mass, every day in every city, bread and wine become body and blood. That is a direct divine intervention. You cannot "test" it scientifically, so your scenarios above are inadequate. You will take inability to test as evidence of absence? Take care with that.

How can something that is taken to happen, in every sense except being verifiable, really be taken as having happened?

Either the scenarios are inadequate, or it never happened.

Thanks Mr Occam, I'm done with your razor, you can have it back now.

I believe in order to understand. When my intelligence is no longer enough I can believe or not, depending on the reasonableness of what is in front of me.
The question of divine intervention is a very old one that no Christian doubts - the most fundamental divine intervention is Jesus, man and God. There is no point discussing the reasonableness with a non-believer of the real presence at Mass if the incarnation itself is impossibility. If the incarnation is accepted as the most fitting story of man, then any other divine intervention is on the face of it at least possible and can then be looked at with an open mind.

Appeals to Occam's razor are no longer helpful for the atheist. When lack of knowledge of nature meant a god of the gaps was widely accepted, fine, but now, it works the other way - the simplicity of God is the least involved explanation of first cause / creatio ex nihilo etc.

[carmonk]

ChrisGB said:

Appeals to Occam's razor are no longer helpful for the atheist. When lack of knowledge of nature meant a god of the gaps was widely accepted, fine, but now, it works the other way - the simplicity of God is the least involved explanation of first cause / creatio ex nihilo etc.

Or put another way, God was once god of many gaps but now all but one of the gaps have been filled by science so he's god of that one and that one alone.

And soon that will go too and nobody will be able to find God at all.