Premise: God exists and is responsible for the creation of the universe.
God Created The Ten Comandments…AND the perfect, unbreakable laws of chemistry, based upon perfect, unbreakable laws of physics, based upon perfect, unbreakable laws of mathematics.
One one side, we are presented with Truth written in a Book, on the other side, we are presented with Truth written into the very substance of Creation itself.
How can one be wrong?
[QUOTE=Enola Straight]
Premise: God exists and is responsible for the creation of the universe.
God Created The Ten Comandments…AND the perfect, unbreakable laws of chemistry, based upon perfect, unbreakable laws of physics, based upon perfect, unbreakable laws of mathematics.
One one side, we are presented with Truth written in a Book, on the other side, we are presented with Truth written into the very substance of Creation itself.
How can one be wrong?
[/QUOTE]
Not sure what you are asking. Are trying to determine if it is possible to reconcile the Bible with observable reality?
[QUOTE=Enola Straight]
Premise: God exists and is responsible for the creation of the universe.
God Created The Ten Comandments…AND the perfect, unbreakable laws of chemistry, based upon perfect, unbreakable laws of physics, based upon perfect, unbreakable laws of mathematics.
One one side, we are presented with Truth written in a Book, on the other side, we are presented with Truth written into the very substance of Creation itself.
How can one be wrong?
[/QUOTE]
The ten commandments do not conflict with observable reality or the laws of physics.
As for the entire bible in general, it cannot be reconciled with observed reality in such a way that both are true and that the bible accurately describes reality. This leaves you with only a few options:
Some or all of the bible is not meant to be taken literally. It may be true “allegorically”, or have “true lessons” in its stories, but they do not truly describe reality - which is okay because that’s not their purpose.
God is a trickster, adjusting reality to look the way it does to enable belief in the bible to be a measure of faith, rather than the obvious thing to do.
God is a liar, and the bible is not true. He wrote it for reasons unknown.
(In the scenario presented, you have explicitly ruled out option 4.)
[QUOTE=Enola Straight]
Premise: God exists and is responsible for the creation of the universe.
God Created The Ten Comandments…AND the perfect, unbreakable laws of chemistry, based upon perfect, unbreakable laws of physics, based upon perfect, unbreakable laws of mathematics.
One one side, we are presented with Truth written in a Book, on the other side, we are presented with Truth written into the very substance of Creation itself.
How can one be wrong?
[/QUOTE]
God can’t break the laws of physics, chemistry, and mathematics? What a punk.
Premise : If God exists, he can do any damn thing he pleases, including changing the laws of physics five times a day and changing our memories so that no one notices.
[QUOTE=Enola Straight]
Premise: God exists and is responsible for the creation of the universe.
God Created The Ten Comandments…AND the perfect, unbreakable laws of chemistry, based upon perfect, unbreakable laws of physics, based upon perfect, unbreakable laws of mathematics.
One one side, we are presented with Truth written in a Book, on the other side, we are presented with Truth written into the very substance of Creation itself.
How can one be wrong?
[/QUOTE]
Even under your premise, the book can be wrong. Unless you wish to add to your premise that not only God exists and is responsible for the creation of the universe, but that there exists some book somewhere that has “the Truth” from said God. (which cannot be the King James Bible, since that is rife with self-contradictions)
[QUOTE=Contrapuntal]
Premise : If God exists, he can do any damn thing he pleases, including changing the laws of physics five times a day and changing our memories so that no one notices.
[/QUOTE]
I agree. If he can’t do that, then he’s just a technologically advanced space alien.
BTW, can the OP clarify how this thread is different from this thread which was active until just a few days ago.
[QUOTE=begbert2]
This leaves you with only a few options:
Some or all of the bible is not meant to be taken literally. It may be true “allegorically”, or have “true lessons” in its stories, but they do not truly describe reality - which is okay because that’s not their purpose.
God is a trickster, adjusting reality to look the way it does to enable belief in the bible to be a measure of faith, rather than the obvious thing to do.
God is a liar, and the bible is not true. He wrote it for reasons unknown.
[/QUOTE]
Another option is that we have yet to fully understand the Bible, which is in lines with your 2nd option as if we extend faith to God, God will usually confirm it.
[QUOTE=Contrapuntal]
God can’t break the laws of physics, chemistry, and mathematics? What a punk.
Premise : If God exists, he can do any damn thing he pleases, including changing the laws of physics five times a day and changing our memories so that no one notices.
[/QUOTE]
Physics and chemistry I’ll give you, but mathematics is too much, unless you understand mathematics in a directly empirical sense. God can make the universe possess Euclidean geometry, he can make the universe possess non-Euclidean geometry, perhaps he can even make the universe stop being the sort of thing that has geometrical properties, but neither he nor anyone else can do anything about the fact that the Pythagorean theorem holds true of Euclidean geometry.
[QUOTE=kanicbird]
Another option is that we have yet to fully understand the Bible, which is in lines with your 2nd option as if we extend faith to God, God will usually confirm it.
[/QUOTE]
All due respect, but no. The bible makes plenty of specific assertions about the universe’s history and man’s early development that are unambiguously incorrect from a factual perspective (with regard to the observable reality which we inhabit). Either they’re allegorical, they’re false, or god is a trickster. (Or the invalidated option 4.)
[QUOTE=John Mace]
I agree. If he can’t do that, then he’s just a technologically advanced space alien.
BTW, can the OP clarify how this thread is different from this thread which was active until just a few days ago.
[/QUOTE]
I was unaware of that thread. It touches on my points and answers them quite well.
Carry on.
[QUOTE=Enola Straight]
I was unaware of that thread. It touches on my points and answers them quite well.
Carry on.
[/QUOTE]
Anyone wishing to bang his head against that wall again, be my guest. I’ll take a pass.
[QUOTE=Indistinguishable]
Physics and chemistry I’ll give you, but mathematics is too much, unless you understand mathematics in a directly empirical sense. God can make the universe possess Euclidean geometry, he can make the universe possess non-Euclidean geometry, perhaps he can even make the universe stop being the sort of thing that has geometrical properties, but neither he nor anyone else can do anything about the fact that the Pythagorean theorem holds true of Euclidean geometry.
[/QUOTE]
I’m not convinced that mathematics is a feature of the universe, or has any “laws.” Isn’t it all axiomatic?
At any rate, if God invented humans, and humans invented math, he can make math be anything he wants. He can make a world where triangles are impossible.
[QUOTE=Contrapuntal]
I’m not convinced that mathematics is a feature of the universe, or has any “laws.” Isn’t it all axiomatic?
At any rate, if God invented humans, and humans invented math, he can make math be anything he wants. He can make a world where triangles are impossible.
[/QUOTE]
Mathematics is a system of self-consistent rules that naturally follow from a small number of basic axioms. (The axioms are the “laws”.) Therefore, if you accept the axioms, then you must accept all the rest of mathematics, since they rely on nothing else (not on reality, not on god, not on anything besides the axioms). And, since the axioms are defined as being accepted within the mathematical system regardless of all external factors, they are not subject to reality or god either. They’re not dependent on man, either; 1+1=2 was true even before proto-man figured out how to count, sheerly as a side effect of what the concepts 1,+,=,and 2 are, even if those concepts are unknown, unexplored, or forgotten.
If God made a man that couldn’t think up mathematics, that doesn’t matter. Rocks can’t think up mathematics and it doesn’t stop mathematics from being as it is; changing humans into intellectual rocks would have no more effect on math than the rocks we already have do. It doesn’t change the fact that if we happened to think of the same set of axioms that support our current version of math, all the rest of math would develop naturally from those axioms, whether God likes it or not.
As for triangles, creating a reality where triangles-as-we-know-them couldn’t exist would just mean you’d created a reality where the axioms of math-with-triangles don’t apply to the existing universe. That’s not a problem, though. If I recall correctly, we actually have thought up forms of geometry that don’t have triangles as we know them; isn’t non-euclidian geometry one of these? But, if the universe operated on non-euclidian geometry, that wouldn’t stop regular euclidian geometry from working, just like our euclidean-geometry universe doesn’t stop us from doing non-euclidean geometry.
[QUOTE=begbert2]
As for triangles, creating a reality where triangles-as-we-know-them couldn’t exist would just mean you’d created a reality where the axioms of math-with-triangles don’t apply to the existing universe. That’s not a problem, though. If I recall correctly, we actually have thought up forms of geometry that don’t have triangles as we know them; isn’t non-euclidian geometry one of these? But, if the universe operated on non-euclidian geometry, that wouldn’t stop regular euclidian geometry from working, just like our euclidean-geometry universe doesn’t stop us from doing non-euclidean geometry.
[/QUOTE]
You really think we’re living in a world of Euclidian geometry?
Show me a circle!
[QUOTE=Diomedes]
You really think we’re living in a world of Euclidian geometry?
Show me a circle!
[/QUOTE]
:rolleyes: We’re in one where it applies. You can draw a picture of a circle and make things in the shape of a circle, and while you very likely won’t achieve a perfect circle, the predictions and statements that euclidian geometry makes about circles will be pretty much accurate about your circle, to pretty much the same degree your circle is like the ideal circle.
Not that this matters to my prior post in the slightest; it doesn’t bother non-euclidian geometry that it doesn’t model observable reality; why should euclidean geometry care either way either?
[QUOTE=begbert2]
:rolleyes: We’re in one where it applies. You can draw a picture of a circle and make things in the shape of a circle, and while you very likely won’t achieve a perfect circle, the predictions and statements that euclidian geometry makes about circles will be pretty much accurate about your circle, to pretty much the same degree your circle is like the ideal circle.
Not that this matters to my prior post in the slightest; it doesn’t bother non-euclidian geometry that it doesn’t model observable reality; why should euclidean geometry care either way either?
[/QUOTE]
Lobachevsky’s geometry would work jsut as well for our observable world as Euclid’s. If you can’t get exact measurements, they all work. Just bustin’ balls, no offense intended.
[QUOTE=Diomedes]
Lobachevsky’s geometry would work jsut as well for our observable world as Euclid’s. If you can’t get exact measurements, they all work. Just bustin’ balls, no offense intended.
[/QUOTE]
Work “just as well”? Are you kidding?
Unless by “can’t get exact measurements”, you mean “can’t get any measurements at all”. If you’re blind, all paintings are equally beautiful.
[QUOTE=begbert2]
Work “just as well”? Are you kidding?
Unless by “can’t get exact measurements”, you mean “can’t get any measurements at all”. If you’re blind, all paintings are equally beautiful.
[/QUOTE]
Not at all. Lobachevsky’s world only gets weird (to Euclidean a worldview) when you start dealing with lines extended to the infinte. (which is where the parallel ones meet). You could construct theorums based off Lobachevsky’s world to get a bunch of usable mathematic devices in this world, as long as you’re not too insistent on having squares.
Oh, and from your cite…
[QUOTE=begbert2]
The ten commandments do not conflict with observable reality or the laws of physics.
As for the entire bible in general, it cannot be reconciled with observed reality in such a way that both are true and that the bible accurately describes reality. This leaves you with only a few options:
Some or all of the bible is not meant to be taken literally. It may be true “allegorically”, or have “true lessons” in its stories, but they do not truly describe reality - which is okay because that’s not their purpose.
God is a trickster, adjusting reality to look the way it does to enable belief in the bible to be a measure of faith, rather than the obvious thing to do.
God is a liar, and the bible is not true. He wrote it for reasons unknown.
(In the scenario presented, you have explicitly ruled out option 4.)
[/QUOTE]
God wrote the bible? MEN wrote the bible. Men who’ve been dead for 10,000 years. That’s why it’s not or should never be considered a resource.
Happy St. Valentine’s!
[QUOTE=prleone]
God wrote the bible? MEN wrote the bible. Men who’ve been dead for 10,000 years. That’s why it’s not or should never be considered a resource.
[/QUOTE]
10,000 years, eh? Am I whooshed, or are you just daft?