Enjoy yourself.
You initially asserted that the God of the Bible views humanity as an “afterthought”. I challenge you to read the Bible and then defend this viewpoint. Are you going to do so?
This is a complete non-sequiter. You initially said that humans take up a small portion of the universe and are therefore irrelevant to the creator of the universe, if He exists. I responded by pointing out that small things are not necessarily unimportant things, and offered the microchip as an example. Since you’re only changing the subject, I’m going to assume that you’re not able to defend your initial argument.
The thing is, if god had wanted to create a universe suitable for us, it seems he could’ve done a heck of a better job. Yeah, yeah, I know, god’s unknowable plan and all that, but still, ignoring the god angle for a moment, you really wouldn’t think that we’re the point to this universe just from looking at it, would you?
“Better” is relative to a specific set of goals. It’s an optimization of those goals and without the goals it’s meaningless.
Assuming atoms are necessary at all, and that things couldn’t have condensed into some other form that we might consider quite exotic and unlike atoms.
but I get your point. What I don’t get is how you’re so very adamant in your refusal to consider multiple instances of universe formation.
You accept that it happened.
You state that variables exist
But you refuse to entertain the notion that it could happen more than once, with different variables.
Don’t get it. <shrug> Your reluctance seems… well… contrived.
The goal I presumed was creating a universe suitable for us, as I think I’ve quite explicitly stated. I even included the caveat that the actual goal is unknown. Then I alluded to the fact that it needs a preconceived notion of god and his (unknowable) plan to have us be the point of the universe, since you wouldn’t think so otherwise. None of this does any violence to your definition of ‘better’, so don’t just try to club me over the head with it.
As I did go to Catholic school, I already did read it, several times, the problem is that I also learned about history, science, cosmology an geology. It is clear that for the “god” that could remain in this universe we are an afterthought. Because for the god of the bible we were the beesknees for only a few thousand years (not much to talk about in the last 2000 years), yet Prometheus had given fire to humanity 250,000 years ago or more and it was one of the main reasons we became civilized.
Not that I believe in the Greek gods, but the evidence shows they were more involved and they would be the main suspects if one wants to give a name to the supposed god of this universe. However, history and other evidence also disposes of them, but if you continue to press for the importance of humanity in the universe, the god of the bible just did not pay too much attention in relative terms.
Nope, your idea is the nonsensical one here, we are talking about the universe, we are really not important at that level. Once we realize this then we can plan ahead so some day our descendants will be important at the universal level.
And in what way is it “fantastic” ? I can give a list of reasons why God and other religious claims are ridiculous; what makes multiple universes so “fantastic” ? And how can a speculation that violates no physical laws be as “fantastic” as one that violates many laws ?
Just wanted to expand on this a bit - I think what I was driving at was:
Variables that only ever have one value - forever - aren’t really variables - they’re constants..
This response to GIGObuster seems to me an attempt to recruit him/her as a co-builder of a strawman:
It’s probably an interesting debate. GIGObuster’s “afterthought” assertion might be perceived as odd in theology circles and would need to be better supported if actively debated within those circles perhaps, but that whole argument is really just a sidetrack off of the main discussion here, IMO.
Then you agree that intelligent design is not an adequate answer, right? That has to be right. Right?
Not trying to club you on the head, I just don’t think we can approach it from this direction.
If the only goal is “universe suitable for humans” then we clearly have a universe that meets that condition. You may object to that simplistic analysis and say that a universe that didn’t have any malaria would be “better”, but it has an implied additional goal of reducing human suffering. This is where the problem is, you really need to describe all of those things you think would make it better, and every one of those things will have trade-offs.
If, as you state, the actual goal is unknown, then we can’t say anything about “better”, which is exactly my point.
I would still say that you’re very much assuming “life” in terms of the life we have on Earth. It seems rather odd to me that you’re willing to accept the existence of a creator being - presumably one which is rather more along the lines of ineffable rather than an atomic structure - and yet claim that there can be no unimaginable (for lack of a better term) creations. I mean, to put another way, IIRC you believe in souls, do you not? Something rather distinctly not of any kind of matter at all. And yet the idea of strange life is ridiculous?
Consider a lesser tweaking. Now we have a shorter term universe. Or perhaps a longer term universe, which I suppose under your logic here would mean we’re unlikely to exist, which I suppose technically is true in looking at the whole universe.
But you have already admitted, and indeed accepted wholeheartedly the existence of far “stranger” (in composition terms) beings than those of odd matter. But I do not see why it is an inadequate response; it’s perfectly possible. After all, we are that “some” life, to an extent; for the vast majority of the Earth’s existence, it has had an environment very much unconducive to human life. If when “life” first occurred, it occurred here, then the environment those little doodahs found themselves in would not be much like the one we have now. A human-supporting atmosphere is itself pretty much an cosmological afterthought.
I suppose what i’d consider the “bottom line” is that you poo-poo the idea of strange, unlikely life existing, when we ourselves are pretty much that strange life. Of all the other worlds we’ve seen, the ones that could support us are in the vast minority; our own planet has only been able to support us for a universally short time, and we ourselves have only existed for an even shorter time then that. To claim that the universe is built, designed, created specificially for us turns a rather astonishingly blind idea to the point that there’s an unimaginably large universe outside our window where we don’t fit in. It’s like looking at some mould on a cheese in a fridge in a kitchen, in a city in a country on a planet where in most places mould cannot grow, and then declaring the planet is there specifically for the mould.
This is a complete misrepresentation of what the Bible says. In fact, the Bible makes clear that Christ was sent to Earth within the last 2000 years, and that after Christ’s ascension, the Holy Spirit was sent by God and is God’s presence in the world, among humanity. And, at least in the traditional Christian view, the Holy Spirit is still here. So there’s plenty to talk about in the last 2000 years.
By what standard is God stranger? It is true that God is a spirit being not subject to the physical laws that the physical world operates under. However, people all over the world and all throughout history have had interactions with spirit beings. Hence the existence of spirit beings is not a far-fetched hypothesis. Regardless of whether you agree with it, it is a hypothesis that follows in a natural and straightforward way from the experiences, studies, and traditions of humankind. By contrast, the existence of an infinite number of parallel universes does not follow from anything in human experience. And the existence of complex, intelligent life forms in universes with different sets of physical laws does not follow from anything in human experience.
Why does the universe need a lot more fine-tuning? Why should the fact that only a small portion of the universe is habitable mean argue against an intelligence making it habitable?
Only a small portion of my house is habitable for fish, but does this mean that I’m hostile to fish? On the contrary, if you observed that there is a small portion of my house consisting of water inside a glass tank, with an oxygen pump and a pH meter, where food is provided daily and the tank is cleaned weekly, you’d probably conclude that an intelligent being had set that portion up specifically for fish. And you’d be correct.
Or, to shift metaphors, a computer programmer may allocate far more memory than he needs for a certain program. That doesn’t not mean that he doesn’t care about the program’s data.
And in the case of God creating the universe, we know that God’s powers of creation are infinite. Hence there would be no question of God wasting effort on creating zillions of star systems that do not house intelligent life. That would not, in any way, affect the fact that he created a place where intelligent life can exist.
Or perhaps what you’re upset about is that humanity can’t easily colonize the rest of the universe. But God does not desire that we do that. He never endorses growth for the sake of growth. He wants us to focus on helping each other, not on building high-tech toys and blasting off for other solar systems.
Like if that is the only source of information.
And here is yet another item that gets shot down when one considers what science says about what the heavens are really.
Really, the nano-second you attempt to use cosmology or astronomy you are going beyond the bible and then you have to take into account what is really out there, limiting your horizon to a planet… wait, scratch that, limiting yourself to a box with the stars as holes in the firmament and then pretend that now all other items in the bible are the best evidence is silly.
Nothing has been added or mentioned by god in the last 2000 years, since the dinosaurs pranced around for 300 million years in this planet I do expect to see something similar for us humans, and it is clear to me that just like the gods of ancient Egypt, the god of the bible will be displaced for better faiths in the deep future. (I do think most will have no religion in the deep future, but it is unlikely that there will be none of it; however, it is really naive to think Christianity will be the same or to fade away because of the new religions that will appear in the deep future).
And I do think that not contacting humanity 250,000 years early still demonstrates a horrid lack of attention by the god of the bible to human beings.
I’ll put that book somewhere in my half-mile-high to read list, but I’ll say that I’m not too impressed based on the summary given on that webpage. Firstly, Stenger appears to tackle only four of the constants in the universe, and there are plenty of others that he does not mention. Second, his computer simulations appear to only tackle the question of whether long-lasting stars would exist with alternate constants. Long-lasting stars are only one of many things needed for intelligent life to come about. Thirdly, 100 simulations is a pretty small sample.
Once again, that happens if you limit yourself to the bible. Others that are not limited to it have to point out that deep time makes her/him/it a stranger.
Neither is the theory of relativity and quantum mechanics, and yet they are a component of current cosmological research and the evidence for them goes counter to anything in human experience.
And do we need to point out that those and other theories are being used in the current search for evidence of other universes?
What happened to "be fruitful and multiply? All what you are saying here is just a desire to keep us and the discussion in the planet we have, a very shallow idea.
“It goes against nature in a large field to grow only one shaft of wheat, and in an infinite universe to have only one living world.”
-Metrodorus of Khíos
While it would be unlikely for us to get to the other shafts, I would not stop the future generations from building those wonderful toys.
And what if we are among the few shafts of wheat in the field? Then the stars (and the planets around them) are our destination.
“There would be no advantage to be gained by sowing a field of wheat if the harvest did not return more than was sown.”
-Napoleon Hill 1883 - 1970