From: Bill Roh (billroh@churchofvirus.com)
Date: Fri Jan 25 2002 - 17:51:52 MST
I've responded inline
ben wrote:
> <introductory disclaimer - I am not a "theist", and certainly not trying to
> convert anybody. I'm merely following this argument for the enjoyment it
> gives me, and the possibility of learning something in the process. Call it
> "playing Yaweh's advocate...>
>
> [Bill 0] Divine intervention would violate the 2nd law of thermodynamics
>
> [ben 0] I don't follow that this is true.
>
> [Bill 1] It would voilate the 2nd because it means that energy from outside
> the
> universe would be input into this universe. Which means that there would be
> a
> surplus and a march away from entropy.
>
> [ben 1] Ah, now I've got a clearer picture of what you're getting at. So
> therefore, the energy invested in the intervention would have to originate
> inside the Universe, meaning that the divinity must also reside inside the
> Universe. My argument has no problem with that, being that "divine
> intervention would not necessarily break the 2nd law". Provided that the
> divinity uses energy already existent in the universe being tampered with, I
> see no breakage.
>
[Bill2] I'll agree that as long as the energy comes from this Universe, a
godlike being could act in accordance with the 2nd.
>
> [Bill 0] and if that is the case, tell me which part of our Universe houses
> heaven and hell.
>
> [ben 0] The implied conclusion is that "heaven and hell can't be in our
> Universe, therefore according to the two premises above there can be no
> divine intervention, therefore there can be no proof of god" unless I
> misread you. However, that conclusion relies on other premises as well:
>
> [Bill 1]Ahh, but I thought we were limiting the discussion to the Judeo
> Christian God.
>
> [ben 1] OK, I didn't recognize that limitation. Given that, "Yaweh created
> the universe" according to Genesis, and therefore must have existed previous
> to it. However, how can we be sure that the original word for "universe"
> meant the same thing as we are attributing to it? Is it possible, in the
> model we are discussing, that god was the first object/being in the
> universe, possessing all the potential energy currently dissipated
> throughout it, and then created the rest, with the reporting of said action
> being inaccurate due to either the level of understanding of the reporting
> parties or various edits/translations throughout the time since?
>
[Bill2] In order to suggest that God was the first object in the universe would
be like saying "The most complex entity formed from nothing, and the simple
stuff came later". I have never considered the notion of complexity before
simplicity before, but it does seem awfully unlikely. I am not aware of
something as complex as I imagine a god to be forming spontaneously with
consciousness and power to boot.
This is not to say that the Christian god could not be the first being.
Certainly there was a first being (probably long dead by my guess), but this
implies that evolution was not a part of the picture or a complex entity would
be preceeded by simpler organisms.
>
> [ben 0] A) the common belief that heaven and hell are somehow "on a
> different plane"
> [Bill 1] A> are you suggesting that Heavan and Hell are NOT on a seperate
> plane? (read
> "somplace not in this universe")
> [ben 1] What we end up with is "Heaven and Hell, if they are places, are
> someplace in this universe" which is the possibility I was suggesting in A.
>
> [ben 0]B) the expectation that they are physical places
> [Bill 1]B> If not physical places, and not on a seperate plane (read
> "someplace not in
> this universe")
> [ben 1] I was suggesting the possibility that they are not physical places
> in any universe, but are more like states of being. States of existence are
> commonly referred to in English by the same mechanisms as physical places:
> "Person X is in ecstasy" or "Person X is in a foul temper" or "Person X is
> on the net" - another linguistic detail that could have been lost over time.
>
[Bill 2] A state of being is nice, good sex makes me feel like I am in heaven,
and cleaning up after my cats makes me feel like I'm in hell - however, all
emotions that we have, with few exceptions, are identifiable chemical processes
happening in an electro-chemical dance inside the brain. We can specifically
affect these actions with drugs, EM fields, pain, sound, light..... lots of
things. Though there is still much to learn in this field, the pieces seem to be
falling together in a manner consistent with what we know about electro-chemical
processes.
>
> [ben 0]C) the belief that we would be capable of finding either if it did
> exist, and recognizing it as such.
> [ben 1] Back to the possibility that they _are_ physical places... I can see
> why my original message might not have been clear. The order of B and C
> should have been switched, and B should have been presented as the flipside
> of the AC combination. I apologize for my lack of clarity.
>
> [ben 1] The reason we don't believe in souls is that we have no evidence to
> support that belief. Perhaps we have no evidence because we lack the
> instrumentation to measure them... if so, even if we stumbled on "the Heaven
> quadrant" of the universe, we wouldn't "see" the souls, and therefore would
> not recognize what we had found for what it would be.
It's not because we lack the evidence to to see souls that we do not believe (or
myself anyway), it's because of the unnecessary nature of the soul. If we make a
clone, and it lives as a normal human being, then if you believe in souls, you
have to believe that this clone has one, or how could they function? If they
have a soul, then god must have given it to them. Does this mean god approves of
clones? When did god give this clone his soul? When the DNA from a cell in the
gut of person "A" was implanted into egg of person "B"? What if man makes a man
from scratch - makes the entire DNA sequence from a batch of chemicals. This
will happen eventually. When does the soul part get added. See my point - what
is the purpose of the soul when man does fine without one? I simply seems much
more likely that man is just an animal living on a planet in the far reaches of
the Orion arm of th Milky Way galaxy. Alone. Not that the galaxy might not be
teeming with life, but that we are still somewhat simple apes just learing about
the Universe - to weak and distracted to make an effort to find our neighbors.
And lets face it, the cost to find them can only be measured in time, technology
and expense.
Fun conversation Ben, thanks!
Bill
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