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RE: Can't serve if you don't believe in God? - 12/15/2009 12:12:06 PM

vincentML

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quote:

ORIGINAL: Kirata

quote:

ORIGINAL: vincentML

Furthermore, the evidence tells us... that Life arose from inorganic chemical reactions

Purely as an intellectual matter, "something from nothing" has never appealed to me as a strong argument. I don't care how many pieces of inanimate matter you throw in a pile, or how you arrange them, if it's just a pile of inanimate matter it's not going to wake up and ask what's for lunch. Either quarks and atoms and molecules possess the quality of being alive in some sense, such that in increasingly complex organizations it becomes apparent in terms that we recognize, or else we've got an awful lot of inanimate matter wandering around walking and talking.

K.

I agree it is a difficult problem and a somewhat active research area I am not equipped to discuss. I know there were experiments quite awhile ago at McGill University in Canada I recall where some fellows speculated upon the earth's early atmosphere, ran some electricity through various combinations and supposedly came up with some simple amino acids. I think similar experiments are continuing. I have also read about some experiments with silicon crystals. It is not really "something from nothing" but over long periods of time some inorganic molecules appearing over and again, sometimes replicating successfully (mindlessly, of course) and more often probably failing. If I find anything on it I will share it. I guess a good place to start would be to google "life origins research."

Have you also noticed all the walking and talking inanimate stuff? Whew! I thought i was the only one.

K, here are three links if you wish to pursue it further. Interestingly, the distinction is made between abiogenesis and evolution. Also, the Wiki article mentions the McGill University experiment of Miller-Urey that resulted in the formation of amino acids.

Wiki article

Talk Origins Article

About.com Article

Vincent

< Message edited by vincentML -- 12/15/2009 12:31:24 PM >

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RE: Can't serve if you don't believe in God? - 12/15/2009 1:27:48 PM

vtara

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A little info from our friends at wikipedia:

"Agnosticism is the view that the truth value of certain claims—especially claims about the existence of any deity, but also other religious and metaphysical claims—is unknown or unknowable. Agnosticism can be defined in various ways, and is sometimes used to indicate doubt or a skeptical approach to questions. In some senses, agnosticism is a stance about the differences between belief and knowledge, rather than about any specific claim or belief. As such, the term agnostic does not necessarily signal a particular view about religion or God, as some agnostics also identify as theists or atheists."

There. They're not mutually exclusive. An example of degrees of disbelief could be an agnostic atheist who says that he can't know the unknowable (but still thinks one scenario to be true), and the more radical type, who says that there definitely is no god.

As for Unitarian Universalist churches, I have a friend who used to go to one when she was younger. On a few occasions, I went with her to check it out. It's really not a traditional church, so much as a community group that have a common interest in faith and spirituality. Their Sunday school taught kids about all sorts of different religions (this particular friend can always be trusted to explain away misconceptions about a particular faith). As an atheist myself, I would have no problem going back there. And if I happened to connect with interesting people, learn new things, and have a good time, it could become a regular thing!

Please tell me you've realized that there are indeed many shades of darkness and degrees of cold.

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RE: Can't serve if you don't believe in God? - 12/15/2009 1:39:44 PM

vincentML

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quote:

ORIGINAL: vtara

Please tell me you've realized that there are indeed many shades of darkness and degrees of cold.

Oh yes, of course. I thought I made that clear when I referred to a spectrum of militancy and understanding. Agnosticism is more a position of epistemology than of metaphysics. Seems to me we are saying the same thing, although I did spend more effort on explaining the extreme atheist end of the spectrum. If you think I mistated anything, please correct me.

Vincent

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Our lives begin to end the day we become silent about things that matter. ~ MLK Jr.

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RE: Can't serve if you don't believe in God? - 12/15/2009 1:47:51 PM

vtara

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Oh- I meant cpK69. My bad. I should have clarified that/hit the right reply button.

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RE: Can't serve if you don't believe in God? - 12/15/2009 2:18:10 PM

cpK69

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quote:

ORIGINAL: vtara

Please tell me you've realized that there are indeed many shades of darkness and degrees of cold.

Yes, I believe I've got it.

Edited to add: Thank you.

Kim

< Message edited by cpK69 -- 12/15/2009 2:30:49 PM >

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RE: Can't serve if you don't believe in God? - 12/15/2009 3:47:22 PM

kittinSol

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quote:

ORIGINAL: cpK69

quote:

ORIGINAL: vtara

Please tell me you've realized that there are indeed many shades of darkness and degrees of cold.

Yes, I believe I've got it.

Edited to add: Thank you.

Kim

It was about time

.

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RE: Can't serve if you don't believe in God? - 12/15/2009 6:23:44 PM

Lucylastic

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FR
No Kim I wasn't pointing a finger at you, its just a general feeling.
But living up in Canada I realised many years ago... believe me there are degrees of cold, Also of love of friendship, of most things. For me life is like an onion, with so many layers to get to the heart of the matter.And if you dont cut it right you are gonna get tears.

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RE: Can't serve if you don't believe in God? - 12/15/2009 6:56:56 PM

Kirata

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quote:

ORIGINAL: vincentML

It is not really "something from nothing" but over long periods of time...

Over long periods of time... life came from no-life. Non-living matter became... alive!

If I had a world of my own, everything would be nonsense. Nothing would be what it is because everything would be what it isn't. And contrary-wise; what it is it wouldn't be, and what it wouldn't be, it would. You see? ~Alice

K.

< Message edited by Kirata -- 12/15/2009 7:02:15 PM >

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RE: Can't serve if you don't believe in God? - 12/15/2009 7:43:25 PM

vincentML

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quote:

ORIGINAL: Kirata

quote:

ORIGINAL: vincentML

It is not really "something from nothing" but over long periods of time...

Over long periods of time... life came from no-life. Non-living matter became... alive!

If I had a world of my own, everything would be nonsense. Nothing would be what it is because everything would be what it isn't. And contrary-wise; what it is it wouldn't be, and what it wouldn't be, it would. You see? ~Alice

K.

Well, I gave you some citations for the Science on Abiogenesis. It is not a field with which I have enough familiarity to carry on a discussion. I have no quarrel if you are content to limit your research to Alice.

Vincent

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RE: Can't serve if you don't believe in God? - 12/15/2009 8:41:30 PM

Kirata

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quote:

ORIGINAL: vincentML

Well, I gave you some citations for the Science on Abiogenesis. It is not a field with which I have enough familiarity to carry on a discussion. I have no quarrel if you are content to limit your research to Alice.

Apparently you don't appreciate that the quote from Alice in Wonderland was more relevant to the point I am making than your references to the science of abiogenesis. For life to arise from inanimate matter amounts to pulling a rabbit out of a hat. I am not suggesting that life as we recognize it did not arise in the ways that science is beginning to unravel, but rather that some of our assumptions about the nature of matter have to be wrong for that to have happened. Just as our assumptions about the nature of hats would have to be wrong for rabbits to come out of them.

K.

< Message edited by Kirata -- 12/15/2009 9:01:02 PM >

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RE: Can't serve if you don't believe in God? - 12/15/2009 9:40:29 PM

GotSteel

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quote:

ORIGINAL: Kirata

but also prohibits government actions that unduly favor one religion over another. It also prohibits the government from unduly preferring religion over non-religion, or non-religion over religion. ~Cornell University Law School.

The law in question only requires that someone believe in God in order to serve, not that he engage in any form of observance or make any further stipulations in the matter whatsoever. And therein lies the rub, as far as "religion" is concerned.

K.

Seems like that would unduly favor religions which believe in a god over religions which do not.

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Post #: 91

RE: Can't serve if you don't believe in God? - 12/15/2009 9:44:18 PM

vincentML

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quote:

ORIGINAL: Kirata

quote:

ORIGINAL: vincentML

Well, I gave you some citations for the Science on Abiogenesis. It is not a field with which I have enough familiarity to carry on a discussion. I have no quarrel if you are content to limit your research to Alice.

Apparently you don't appreciate that the quote from Alice in Wonderland was more relevant to the point I am making than your references to the science of abiogenesis. For life to arise from inanimate matter amounts to pulling a rabbit out of a hat. I am not suggesting that life as we recognize it did not arise in the ways that science is beginning to unravel, but rather that some of our assumptions about the nature of matter have to be wrong for that to have happened. Just as our assumptions about the nature of hats would have to be wrong for rabbits to come out of them.

K.

Okay. I understand what you are saying. I can't recall the exact source I read where the issue was discussed. I think it was Dawkins but I am not sure which book. I came away without the slightest impression that there was a change in assumptions about matter at the molecular and crystal level and especially at the level of molecular bond formation.

The envisioned process required an infinitely greater number of small collisions of a random nature and an infinitely greater number of probable failures. The bond angles and energy requirements were not remarkable. But a high concentration was probably required. That's the small, shallow pool argument. There may have been requirements of greater pressure and temperature metrics. I noticed in passing that there is one theory about processes occuring in undersea volcanoes rather than shallow seaside pools.

I really had trouble as I recall following the silicon crystal argument. But let me point out that silicon is just below carbon in the Periodic Table. Silicon and carbon are in the same Family of elements. Silicon has the same bonding properties as carbon. Both form the tetrahedral angles of four covalent bonds. Undoubtably you know that life as we know it is carbon based - all carbohydrates, proteins, fats, alkali bases for DNA, etc are molecules of carbons atoms.

Sorry, didn't mean to go pedantic on you but I want to emphasize the similarity between silicon found in rock and sand and the most important organic element carbon which is itself found as a major ingredient in graphite, diamonds, coal and other inorganic minerals. So the leap between the inorganic world and the organic world is not across so wide a chasm as might at first be expected where the chemistry is concerned.

In the final analysis, if it is your belief that abiogenesis requires us to look at the fundamentals of matter in a new way you really should look to see what the Scientists are saying. I really don't have much more to contribute to your point in any meaningful and satisfying way.

Vincent

< Message edited by vincentML -- 12/15/2009 10:00:00 PM >

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RE: Can't serve if you don't believe in God? - 12/15/2009 9:46:45 PM

GotSteel

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"Unitarian theology is distinguishable from the belief system of modern Unitarian and Unitarian Universalist churches and fellowships in several countries. This is because over time, some Unitarians and many Unitarian Universalists have moved away from the traditional Christian roots of Unitarianism.[3] For example, in the 1890s the American Unitarian Association began to allow non-Christian and non-theistic churches and individuals to be part of their fellowship.[4]
As a result, people who held no Unitarian belief began to be called "Unitarians," simply because they were members of churches that belonged to the American Unitarian Association. After several decades, the non-theistic members outnumbered the theological Unitarians."

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Unitarianism#Distinction_between_theological_and_denominational_Unitarians

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RE: Can't serve if you don't believe in God? - 12/15/2009 10:03:25 PM

vincentML

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quote:

ORIGINAL: GotSteel

quote:

ORIGINAL: Kirata

but also prohibits government actions that unduly favor one religion over another. It also prohibits the government from unduly preferring religion over non-religion, or non-religion over religion. ~Cornell University Law School.

The law in question only requires that someone believe in God in order to serve, not that he engage in any form of observance or make any further stipulations in the matter whatsoever. And therein lies the rub, as far as "religion" is concerned.

K.

Seems like that would unduly favor religions which believe in a god over religions which do not.

You should take a look at the Case Law we discussed earlier in this thread, Steel. You will find that non-believers were not left in jeopardy.

Vincent

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Our lives begin to end the day we become silent about things that matter. ~ MLK Jr.

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Post #: 94

RE: Can't serve if you don't believe in God? - 12/16/2009 5:02:58 AM

GotSteel

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I did, I'm big on reading a whole thread before responding to any of it.

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RE: Can't serve if you don't believe in God? - 12/16/2009 7:26:27 AM

vincentML

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quote:

ORIGINAL: Kirata

I am not suggesting that life as we recognize it did not arise in the ways that science is beginning to unravel, but rather that some of our assumptions about the nature of matter have to be wrong for that to have happened.
K.

quote:

Over long periods of time... life came from no-life. Non-living matter became... alive!

Thinking about the two comments you made, I suggest our assumptions about the nature of matter need not be wrong, and I doubt that they are (at least on the molecular and macro level, leaving out any thought of subatomic or cosmic quantum physics)

I think we have to rethink our assumptions about what life is, not what matter is.

No scientist believes that "non-living matter became alive," as you put it. When I taught high school biology and chemistry many moons ago we tried to define life by it's characteristics, the most essential being the ability to reproduce itself.

Were I teaching the subject today I would have to focus my definition all the more on the amazing structure and chemical behavior of DNA in the process of replicating itself from “spare parts” in its immediate environment and the ability of DNA to act as a template for the construction of proteins from which the functioning structures of living cells are made.

Life is the sum of the functions of organic molecules, i.e. carbon chained and ringed molecules constructed by DNA. These organic molecules are made of a few of the 90 naturally occurring inorganic atoms.

I certainly did not mean to leave the impression that a bunch of inorganic minerals came “alive.” There was a threshold (probably many times) where inorganic atoms (as all atoms are) became so organized to permit self-replication. Searching for the origins of life basically means searching for the circumstances that would favor replication of molecules.

Vincent

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Our lives begin to end the day we become silent about things that matter. ~ MLK Jr.

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RE: Can't serve if you don't believe in God? - 12/16/2009 2:13:25 PM

GotSteel

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quote:

ORIGINAL: Kirata

Purely as an intellectual matter, "something from nothing" has never appealed to me as a strong argument.

So you're saying that god can't exist?

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RE: Can't serve if you don't believe in God? - 12/17/2009 12:32:40 PM

calamitysandra

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quote:

ORIGINAL: cpK69

If I asked you "Do you believe in Santa Claus" would you feel the same way?

No. But if you would try to sow doubt where the Christkindchen is concerned ...

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RE: Can't serve if you don't believe in God? - 12/17/2009 2:19:56 PM

Kirata

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quote:

ORIGINAL: GotSteel
quote:

ORIGINAL: Kirata
Purely as an intellectual matter, "something from nothing" has never appealed to me as a strong argument.

So you're saying that god can't exist?

Well what the fuck? You quoted what I said. If that conflicts with whatever concept of god you have in mind here, so be it. How would I know?

K.

< Message edited by Kirata -- 12/17/2009 2:21:39 PM >

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RE: Can't serve if you don't believe in God? - 12/17/2009 8:17:25 PM

GotSteel

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I'm wondering about your concept of god, is it simpler than a one celled organism? Isn't it a special pleading fallacy to say that a one celled organism could not exist without some form of life to create it but a god can?

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