52 replies to this topic

[fatboy]

\As long as people will live on earth, they will believe in God. Man is designed so that to live without faith, he can not.

Man is destined to create that which he cannot live without. God is coming. But God will come from us. To all my atheist and agnostic brethren: There is a God, and It is us.

WTF?

lol, i assume he means that we will create and merge with superintelligent machines and will become Gods.

Yeah, had to do a couple of shots first to get back to where that dude was coming from. But think you almost got it with the following edit:

"... he means that we will create and merge with superintelligent machines and will become that which we call God."

[medicineman]

"My ego taught me a new pride, I teach it to mankind: no longer bury your head in the sand of heavenly things, but bear it freely instead, an earthly head that creates a meaning for the earth" Nietzsche

While I am for living a healthy and a prosperous, long life, if I take one thing from Nietzsche, it is that impermanence is the shit...

Edited by medicineman, 16 November 2009 - 03:44 AM.

[CerebralCortex]

"My ego taught me a new pride, I teach it to mankind: no longer bury your head in the sand of heavenly things, but bear it freely instead, an earthly head that creates a meaning for the earth" Nietzsche

While I am for living a healthy and a prosperous, long life, if I take one thing from Nietzsche, it is that impermanence is the shit...

Ya bullshit!

[fatboy]

"My ego taught me a new pride, I teach it to mankind: no longer bury your head in the sand of heavenly things, but bear it freely instead, an earthly head that creates a meaning for the earth" Nietzsche

While I am for living a healthy and a prosperous, long life, if I take one thing from Nietzsche, it is that impermanence is the shit...

Ya bullshit!

It really doesn't matter what color of shit it is, transience just is.

[CerebralCortex]

It really doesn't matter what color of shit it is, transience just is.

He didn't say "transience" (which I take to mean the change in state of a being over time) he said impermanence and if to is suggesting its preferable to permanence then I disagree. It seems he's suggesting we all have "our time" and then pass on which I couldn't possibly ever agree with as a transhumanist, because to me it characterises what is wrong with the human condition as it stands.

[fatboy]

It really doesn't matter what color of shit it is, transience just is.

He didn't say "transience" (which I take to mean the change in state of a being over time) he said impermanence and if to is suggesting its preferable to permanence then I disagree. It seems he's suggesting we all have "our time" and then pass on which I couldn't possibly ever agree with as a transhumanist, because to me it characterises what is wrong with the human condition as it stands.

Okay, then. It really doesn't matter what color of shit it is, impermanence just is.

[Singularity]

LOL

Delusional people are hilarious!!!

Yes, ever notice how the majority of comedy and satire is devoted to laughing at the irrational? Either we are laughing at the idiotic, or we are laughing WITH those who are exasperated with the idiotic. I don't mean to overgeneralize, but this does seem to be the majority.

It's like slipping on a banana peel. It's funny because the physical world randomly tricked the person who stepped on the peel because they were not prepared for the physics. But, some people seem to trick themselves with their irrational behavior. This is even funnier. They are constantly slipping into one embarrassing situation after another and they seem to be blind to certain causes and effects.

[Teixeira]

I'm going to have a go at pointing out the flaws in his argument[sic].

As long as people will live on earth, they will believe in God.

I live on Earth and I don't believe in god.
Or do you mean the population in general? Still no. Religiosity and theism aren't an inherent part of human nature, but are obtained through influence (or indoctrination) made easy thanks to our curious nature.

Man is designed so that to live without faith, he can not.

And what evidence can you give us that points to an inherent design in human nature that keeps us from living without 'faith' in a god? And why does it seem that I lack this mechanism, am I not human too?

The fact that faith gives him strength to ignore the aging processes that occur in his body to understand many religious people.

We've come this far in creating amazing AI yet we still fail at translating language properly =/.
Belief in a god (speaking as an ex-christian) never led me to ignore the horrors of the aging process, and frankly I don't want to ignore them; Death is barbaric and it should be stopped. Weather or not belief in god eases this discomfort of aging it still remains irrational to believe without evidence.

"am I not human too?"
Yes I think you must be, but let me ask you a question: Did you designed yourself? That is, do you have any responsability in the kind of body you have or did it come "just like that"!? If you have no responsability in the kind of body you have, how can you be sure that you know all the details of it´s constitution, that is, what kind of misteries can your body hide from you? How can you know that, given the fact that your body is not a product of your hands? (only in this case you would know exactly what was inside it).
So, following this reasoning, even God can be hided inside us and we´ll never know untill the day we happen to find Him!! Am I right or am I wrong?

[Cyberbrain]

Yes I think you must be, but let me ask you a question: Did you designed yourself? That is, do you have any responsability in the kind of body you have or did it come "just like that"!? If you have no responsability in the kind of body you have, how can you be sure that you know all the details of it´s constitution, that is, what kind of misteries can your body hide from you? How can you know that, given the fact that your body is not a product of your hands? (only in this case you would know exactly what was inside it).
So, following this reasoning, even God can be hided inside us and we´ll never know untill the day we happen to find Him!! Am I right or am I wrong?

I got to say, that reasoning is incredibly flawed.

What you say is that if we are not responsible for our "design" then we can not know everything about us. Why? What about evolution, what about science?

No one said that we don't have the ability to understand our bodies and nature. We know quite a large deal about ourselves and how we function.

...(only in this case you would know exactly what was inside it).

This is definitely not the case. Everything around us, that is not designed by us, is formed by nature. And we know a lot about how nature works.

Actually it is our knowledge of nature (physics, biology, etc) that enables us to design stuff.

[Ben Simon]

I just discovered this thread.

Unbelievable. Some of you people really disgust me.

Someone for whom English is likely a second language attempts to start a conversation about the origins of and reasons for theism and you guys set upon and ridicule them like a grinning mob.

I come here so as to keep up with and engage in ideas relevant to life extension, and I've conversed with some smart, reasonable people and learned a lot... but boy do I get sick of the peanut gallery at this place.

[Teixeira]

Yes I think you must be, but let me ask you a question: Did you designed yourself? That is, do you have any responsability in the kind of body you have or did it come "just like that"!? If you have no responsability in the kind of body you have, how can you be sure that you know all the details of it´s constitution, that is, what kind of misteries can your body hide from you? How can you know that, given the fact that your body is not a product of your hands? (only in this case you would know exactly what was inside it).
So, following this reasoning, even God can be hided inside us and we´ll never know untill the day we happen to find Him!! Am I right or am I wrong?

I got to say, that reasoning is incredibly flawed.

What you say is that if we are not responsible for our "design" then we can not know everything about us. Why? What about evolution, what about science?

No one said that we don't have the ability to understand our bodies and nature. We know quite a large deal about ourselves and how we function.

...(only in this case you would know exactly what was inside it).

This is definitely not the case. Everything around us, that is not designed by us, is formed by nature. And we know a lot about how nature works.

Actually it is our knowledge of nature (physics, biology, etc) that enables us to design stuff.

"We know quite a large deal about ourselves and how we function"
The problem is not what we know but what we don´t know! How can we evaluate the part that we don´t know? Is it the most important part? And what if it is? And what if the most important mysteries are exactlly in that part that we don´t know? (that wouldn´t happen if we had designed ourselves. There would be no surprises!).

[Cyberbrain]

The problem is not what we know but what we don´t know! How can we evaluate the part that we don´t know? Is it the most important part? And what if it is? And what if the most important mysteries are exactlly in that part that we don´t know? (that wouldn´t happen if we had designed ourselves. There would be no surprises!).

That sounds like christian science ... just because there are gaps in the theory or because we have little information on something we must automatically assume mystical forces at play.

There will come a time when science has a 100% complete picture of how everything works, till then I don't want to dwell in mysticism.

[Cyberbrain]

that wouldn´t happen if we had designed ourselves. There would be no surprises!.

We have the ability to design humans now. Cloning, designer babies, genetic engineering, etc. It's illegal, but it's possible.

[Teixeira]

that wouldn´t happen if we had designed ourselves. There would be no surprises!.

We have the ability to design humans now. Cloning, designer babies, genetic engineering, etc. It's illegal, but it's possible.

You manipulate biological material but nothing can garantee that you know all the misteries that are inside it! To design it you had to start from zero! But you start with all that biological material already (even if it is small. that doesn´t mean anything). Did anybody produced a virus/bacteria in the lab? No? Ok that´s it!
To provoque mutations in human beeings is not to design them is to modified them. And that is something absolutely different!
Genetic engineering is like LEGO, you already have the pieces to make the house.
So far, designing biological material is impossible to humans.

[Teixeira]

The problem is not what we know but what we don´t know! How can we evaluate the part that we don´t know? Is it the most important part? And what if it is? And what if the most important mysteries are exactlly in that part that we don´t know? (that wouldn´t happen if we had designed ourselves. There would be no surprises!).

That sounds like christian science ... just because there are gaps in the theory or because we have little information on something we must automatically assume mystical forces at play.

There will come a time when science has a 100% complete picture of how everything works, till then I don't want to dwell in mysticism.

No, you don´t have to do it. It´s more like when mystical forces put´s you against the wall and leave you with no reasonable options. That´s more like that.
About the 100% theorie, I wouldn´t be so sure if I were you!

[Moonbeam]

As long as people will live on earth, they will believe in God. Man is designed so that to live without faith, he can not.

I do OK without it.

[MoodyBlue]

Perhaps what is needed is for people to define what they mean by "God". If one has a basic definition of God as an individual which humans through their vain imaginations have assigned anthropomorphic qualities (even conceiving the source of existence as an individual is already creating an anthropomorphic image since we are individuals), then maybe it would be better to be an atheist. But if one has a definition like that of St. Thomas Aquinas which is that God is not an individual, but rather is bodiless, infinite, eternal, boundless, etc., and currently beyond the human mind to be able to comprehend, then such a definition has meaning. Otherwise as a true atheist one believes that everything which exists including oneself is the product of blind energy.

[Forever21]

As long as people will live on earth, they will believe in God. Man is designed so that to live without faith, he can not.
The fact that faith gives him strength to ignore the aging processes that occur in his body to understand many religious people.

Changes in faith in God, will only happen with the advent of intelligent robots that do not age, so that faith in God and eternal life for them will be incomprehensible.

Nothing makes me feel energized than a good bu11sh1t first thing in the morning.

[Connor MacLeod]

There will come a time when science has a 100% complete picture of how everything works, till then I don't want to dwell in mysticism.

Is this a prophecy or do you have a rational argument?

[Cyberbrain]

There will come a time when science has a 100% complete picture of how everything works, till then I don't want to dwell in mysticism.

Is this a prophecy or do you have a rational argument?

Perhaps I should of said 99%. Just speculating, even if humanity continues to grow and advance for millions of years science will no doubt become more accurate (who knows maybe we'll even find the theory of everything too) but metaphysically speaking it may be possible we're in a computer simulation and that it's programed so that we may never know the truth). Either way the universe is what we got to deal with now and the best way to do it is with science and reason. Not religion, mysticism, new ageism, or fantasies.

I'm not denying that there might be a god, or supernatural forces, or some alien programmer controlling everything, but these are all fantasies with literally no evidence or rational arguments behind them.

My overall opinion for this thread: let's make due with what we have (the universe) and make the best of it through the advancement of technology until further notice.

Edited by Cyberbrain, 10 March 2010 - 05:43 AM.

[Cyberbrain]

You manipulate biological material but nothing can garantee that you know all the misteries that are inside it!

Well we already know a great deal about "what's inside them". From the atomic level we have physics, from the molecular we have chemistry and from the cellular we have biology. We don't know EVERYTHING, but the gap between what we know and don't know is becoming ever so smaller and smaller.

To design it you had to start from zero!

For me to literally start from zero I'd have to invent a universe. That level of engineering is still a bit out of my league.

But you start with all that biological material already (even if it is small. that doesn´t mean anything). Did anybody produced a virus/bacteria in the lab? No?

We can produce bacteria and viruses in the lab. Maybe not new types, but we can produce them.

So far, designing biological material is impossible to humans.

You mean creating new life is impossible? Even so, we are extremely close. It's only a matter of years:

Scientists Create a Form of Pre-Life
Life’s First Spark Re-Created in the Laboratory
Successfully built a synthetic chromosome out of laboratory chemicals
Synthetic Life / Synthetic Biology

Edited by Cyberbrain, 10 March 2010 - 06:04 AM.

[Luna]

Actually humans already design quite a bit of biological material even to the point of constructing organs, new virus or editing a human's genome with gene therapy!

There are attempts to make "life" from scratch which have been pretty close, some I think even succeed but just weren't very complex even on a one cell complexity scale. But self replicating molecules were already made.

It's just easier to take an existing virus, change it's dna and let it multiply, that IS editing biological material.
Also gene therapy is just that. As well as the organs created in the lab from just cells.

[Luna]

I don't know if we can ever know 100% everything because there will always be the one question: Why anything at all? because by all logic nothing is supposed to be, sort of. Wow aren't we at least a bit lucky then that it isn't the case?

I think even when we know everything there will be this ONE thing which our only answer we will have for it is "because". And that thing is why is there energy in the first place to do everything that we are explaining now with science.

And seriously if someone comes and says "Well, GOD!" then it's just the chicken and the egg "Then WHY GOD!" "BECAUSE!".. It doesn't matter what we apply the because too, God, Zero Point Energy, Big Bang, there will be a because and saying the BECAUSE is an intelligent being instead of a physical science doesn't make it much better I think. It just makes it easier for religious people.

Edited by Luna, 10 March 2010 - 09:57 AM.