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Re: Cookbook for Creation

Okay, I thought I was going to have a bit of time to do this, but life has been happening in the mean time, so I still don’t have much time to spend here. I will come back to this, but it’ll be Wednesday at least before I can really spend any time here and give this my full attention. If not Wednesday, then Sunday at the earliest. I apologise, but I’m just really busy.

Anyway, I just wanted to pop back to say one or two more things about significance being attached to things. The first is bouncing off of OvrLrd’s musical example.

Okay, back in the day Bach wrote chorales. As you may know, there are some rules to how to compose this kind of music - you do not use parallell 5th, you do not use parallell 8ths and you do not, not use a flattened 5th. In fact, in European music of this time, this was a cardinal sin - almost literally. To the ear of people of that time this made a horrible sound, and they called the interval between the root and a flattened 5th the Devil’s Interval. And they really meant it. They were afraid of such a sound in the same way, maybe, as people today are afraid of ouija boards.

Now, that’s attatching a great deal of significance to something arbitrary. I think you’d find few today who would give this claim any creedence. And I defy anyone at all to give me an example of a blues song that doesn’t use it. It’s called the “blues note” for a reason. Rock and roll & heavy metal would have a very hard time without that particular sound, too.

Okaym, the second example I wanted to give was touching on semiology again. I want you all to just consider the word “pain” for a minute. What does it mean to you? What connotations do you give it? How does it make you feel if you ponder it? Does it bring back any memories for you? What, basically, do you think the word “pain” means?

Really do just think about it for a minute or so. Why does it mean what it means? After all, it’s just four arbitrary shapes. You can even use different shapes for some of the letters. If the “a” was not how it appears here, then it wouldn’t necessarily be wrong. You could get rid of the bit above the loop and it’d still be correct and recognisably an “a”, although you might want to stretch it vertically a bit. The letters themselves have no real significance. And the word itself has only the significance that you give it. I can probably guess the kinds of things you’ve been thinking about in relation to the significance of the word. Personally, I was using the French word for “bread”.

This is how I see the Tree Of Life. You can give meaning to it if you wish. But it’s the significance that you give it. Some find meaning in all sorts of things. Some people might give a certain song significance because it was on when they met their husbands or wives. It’s “their song”. It’s profound to them. Does that make “Especially For You” a deep and meaningful song? In my estimation, no it doesn’t.

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Re: Cookbook for Creation

Excuse me? I was the one who claimed that one needs to be selfaware in order to create in the first place! I’m glad YOU admit this point. Now all I have to do is try and convince you that energy is not selfaware.

Why? If you have the ability to create, you’re more likely to create chaos than order. Everything you make without (or even with) tools, will be less than perfect and asymmetrical. Drawing a line with a pencil will hardly ever result in a perfect straight line. Even transistors are imperfect. Also, we humans are selfaware, but do you think we’ve created order or chaos in this world?

Never. That could only happen if energy was indeed selfaware. It takes a selfaware human being to create a piece of crystal stemware.

Exactly, energy is merely a requirement; it does not have the ability to create.

Yes, I agree. No comments here.

Uhm, Eternal was also the name of a band. They used to change appearance as well. Why do you keep insisting on these vague comparisons? The fact that many religions say the same thing about god, does not mean that energy is by definition god. It’s hardly an indication. Many religions also claim that god is omniscient and omnipotent, which would imply that he knew on forehand what was going to happen.

No, energy does not create. It’s merely a requirement. You can turn energy into mass and vice versa, but energy cannot turn itself into mass. Therefore there is no indication that energy is selfaware.

Well, if I were to use your logic I’d say that you have not yet reached the level of awareness required to see that this is definitely not enough evidence

Just keep saying that to yourself. Your knowledge of science is above average and definitely better than mine, but I don’t think the same applies to your logic.

Yes, but you need to make sure that the facts of science you apply are relevant to your subject.

Energy is eternal: agreed.
Energy can be turned into matter and vice versa: agreed.
Energy equals god: why, just because many religions attribute similar characteristics to god?
Energy is selfaware: what makes you think so?

There are not enough pencils in this universe to connect the dots you are presenting. They are lightyears apart.

Roel

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Re: Cookbook for Creation

I see reality stuck in the middle…

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Re: Cookbook for Creation

I believe I said I was turning my ego off. I guess you decided not to join me.

Ahhhh, no. That would be an incorrect assertion of yours. I have, indeed, reviewed how the Tree Of Life reflects the design of the 3 primary functional systems of the human body. In other words, yes, I have mapped the two. You can deny it all you wish, which amounts to denying the architecture of your own body, but it does not “make me wrong”. Disconfirmation bias, I would say.

Interesting how you picked this one out. Couldn’t pick one which you could give a more convincing debunking to, eh? Sure, go ahead, throw the arms out (oh, I am so punny). I only threw them in there to, once again, draw your ire. I still think you need to come up with better evidence against what I am saying for the primary human body systems for dealing with the external world.

Yep. That one, I will give you, was “crowbarred” in there. Again, on purpose.

And I’d say two things in response:

  1. You appear to be taking an extremely narrow definition of “locomotion”. If you wish to discuss what word might better reflect the primary bodily system that makes possible all motion, then I am fine with dealing with your semantics, rather than the basic functional concept. (Another recurring theme)
  2. I would also say that you are not looking far enough back…you start with the legs, and stop at the muscles. Yet it is self-evident through human anatomy that the triad heart-lung system is the primary subsystem of respiration… a necessary prerequisite for any/all bodily motion. It is no different than a compressor and pump in an air conditioning system. (Body system, man-made system…yes, another recurring theme)

Oh, but it IS evidence. And the fact that it is the architecture of all humans makes it strong evidence indeed.

Hmmm. Yes, there could be a clue to this dilemma in one of these two words. Given that I am a certified systems engineer, and that systems engineering relies on semiology to define relationships between things, their functions, and their extant operations (that’s THREE recurring themes! I’m wondering when you are going to start addressing some of them), I guess that would make me a professional semiologist. Most definitely this is true with the definition of semiology as “The use of signs in signaling, as with a semaphore.” Another word for this is information (recurring theme).

Oh, but I am not speaking metaphors, kind sir. Quite simply, because the human body is an organized system of subsystems, it is subject to the same systemic analysis that any system is. There is no doubt that the primary human body subsystems, which provide the necessary functions for interacting with the extant world, are a triad: Cognition (brain & sensory organs), Respiration (if you don’t like Locomotion, provided by the heart and lungs), and Reproduction. Slither all you want, my friend, but you know this is true.

Yes, I did. And you cannot pretend that I did not reply. You can claim all you want that your uninformed (or let’s just say *under-*informed, to be nice) debunking is not doing a service to mankind. However, what you cannot deny is that under-informed actions can (and do) do disservice to mankind. Such actions as you enjoy participating in are the same sorts of things that were used by the Roman Catholic Church against Galileo. And yes, I would say that entire fiasco was a great disservice to mankind… in the name of religion, no less.

Allow me to correct you:

  1. I did not word it as you have quoted.
  2. I am in no way asking you to provide evidence for the non-existence of God.
  3. I am asking a very viable question, which demands evidence, related to some very strong statements you have made about mathematical probability.
  4. If you are going to make strong statements about mathematical probability, I would think you could justify them, and hopefully with statistics (as this goes together with probability in mathematics).

It is quite clear what you are doing here, but in case some reading cannot yet see it, let’s explain, shall we? You know where the answer will lead, and so you do not wish to answer. For all the wailing and demands of evidence you have laid at my feet, now we see the great Trollface cannot sustain his own argument. Indeed, he shies away from justifying his position for he knows how it will end up. This from the man who has scolded me for similar things.

I will, once again, give you the precise quote that I wish you to answer (and that you continue to ignore and try to wiggle away from). I expect you to address THIS question, not the question you wish to avoid:

“What is your evidence, your proof, that intelligent design is less likely than an accidental universe?”

You have stated your belief, now as a good debater, I should expect that you would support it.

Yes, indeed. And might I point out (again) that you have provided absolutely no evidence to support your thinking… not even the “weak analogical” evidence, so to speak. Well done. Your debate coach would probably be proud.

There are still a lot of topics you have left along the side of the road. Would you like me to gather them up and present them to you? As you can see, I have taken to explicitly labeling the recurring themes that you ignore and do not appear to want to talk about. Could that possibly be because you DO see how they all relate to one another? Could it possibly be that your willingness to ignore these recurring themes, and their relationships, actually do represent a level of evidence that you have not been prepared to deal with? Or…it is just a coincidence that you do not address the very concerns that are the crux of my evidence?

RMT

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Re: Cookbook for Creation

Looking at the legend, I see four, mutually-embedded, hierarchical systems.

RMT

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Re: Cookbook for Creation

I’ve never denied it.

Good luck. Considering you are energy, and you are self-aware, I’d say you’ve got an uphill battle. And you consistently provide no evidence. )

And I’m just sure you can prove it…

Perfection and/or asymmetry are irrelevant to chaos, as defined by the 2nd Law of Thermodynamics. The statement you make above about “more likely to create chaos than order” is in direct violation of the 2nd Law. Now THAT is abusing science! ) Entropy (also known as the tendency towards chaos) is a measure of order, not symmetry or perfection. Higher levels of organization is what constitutes creation, especially when you employ closed-loop, self-referent systems (recurring theme).

This could be an entire thread with all the evidence that we have created order, because of the systems (recurring theme) we created. Instead of people crapping everywhere, the Romans created the sewage SYSTEM. Thus, we now have an orderly means to dispose of waste. We can also thank the Romans for the system of aquaducts, which provides orderly delivery of water. We can go on and on, but the evidence is that the creation of a great many SYSTEMS has increased the orderliness of our world. It is what gives us our lifestyle of today. You will also note another feature of orderly systems: Their topology is almost exclusively based on the NETWORK. Just like “natural” systems such as our circulatory and nervous systems. I suppose you are now going to claim that we have actually created more chaos than order?

And now I would like you to address the issue of the universe, which has a MUCH larger number of degrees of freedom, and tighter tolerances for operation, than a piece of crystal stemware. Why is it MORE LIKELY that the universe came about by accident, and yet you agree it does not happen with the stemware? Please also recall that both complexity and high levels of organization are what give rise to self-awareness. The evidence of this is the human being.

Both you and trollface keep hiding behind this excuse. And it is time you both stop hiding and provide evidence for your belief, which is NOT proving a negative. In fact, by focusing solely on liklihood and probability we are, by definition, making your question a positive statement. Probability measures that the liklihood of an event WILL happen…not that something does not exist. I am sure you can see the distinction. So here we go again: Provide evidence for the following belief you have:

What is the evidence that compels you to believe that a highly organized, highly complex system such as our universe simply occurred by accident, rather than by design?

You essentially admit you have no evidence to support the similar theory of the crystal stemware. Since the 2nd Law clearly states that complexity & orderliness do not arise of their own accord, where is your evidence for universal creation by accident?

Really, it would be much more simple to say there is no evidence that would make such a belief “reasonable.” At least I will quite badgering you.

RMT

427

Re: Neutrality

Frankly, I have to say this. In a forum, in order to have a proper debate to go on the right path, participants must maintain a sense of neutrality and should not put their feelings in it, in such a way that it would be one-sided. I’m not saying it’s wrong but perhaps, replies have been getting a little touchy around here? Maybe it’s better if we all adopt a sense of neutrality in answering or questioning. Thank You.

P.S This is not meant to be directed at anyone.

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Re: Cookbook for Creation

I’ve got a very brief amount of time now, and I should really be doing something else right at this moment.

But you said it was metaphorical. Either it is or it is not. Which is it? Are you claiming that it can be thought of as a representation, or are you claiming that there is some intrinsic esoterical relationship between the number 9 and the genitals?

Really? I think, in that case, that you need to study the term and the concept it describes a little more closely.

Uh? You’re saying that you just made that up? To, what, see if I’d try to debunk what was patantly nonsense? Why? I’ve seen many odd debating techniques from many people but I have never, ever seen anyone Strawman themselves before. I picked that because it was the most blatantly ridiculous claim. What do you think you’ve proven by having me call a ridiculous claim that you agree is ridiculous ridiculous? If your intent was to derail the conversation and prevent the possibility of anything constructive coming out of it, then well done you’ve succeeded. I didn’t say that that was the only example of ridiculousness there.

So…that and therefore anything based off of that was just a lie to play some kind of childish trick on me. Is that it? Or is there more. You’re going to have to re-post that entire post and this time only include things that aren’t lies, otherwise what on Earth is the point?

I still maintain that that’s muscles.

You know, I was under the impression that the heart was a muscle. And what causes the lungs to move? That would be the diaphragm. What’s the diaphragm? It’s a muscle. The muscles are the root cause of all locomotion in the human body. Any secondary school student should be able to tell you that.

It’s crowbarring again to meet your predetermined critiera. But now you’ll probably simply say that you were lying there, too.

“Evidence” is a different word to “evident”.

You reckon? And yet you seem to have difficulty with the basic concepts behind semiology, let alone the application. You certainly seem to disagree with the very fundamentals of the science when I espouse them, and your entire mode of thinking seems to be based around this basic disagreement. Tell me which semiological school of thought you belong to.

Hmm, it’s that easy to exchange one term for another with a completely different meaning, and yet this is not simply a metaphor? You’re claiming two differnet signifiers with two different signifieds are equal and interchangeable in this context? Interesting, and completely opposed to the basic concepts of semiology.

You do know how systems of signs are generated and derive meaning through language, I presume? Can you explain it, and explain the discrepancies between that and your application?

I may only be an amateur (a word which here means “unpaid”), but it is patently obvious that I am far more qualified, educated and more adept at using this science.

No, you talked about uninformed debunking. The question is what’s wrong with being a “debunker” in and of itself, a phrase which here means in isolation.

Yes. And banning people from a message board is the same kind of thing Hitler did to the Jews. Good greif!

Fair paraphrase.

Yes you are. You’re asking me for proof of my beliefs wich are that God doesn’t exist and therefore couldn’t have created the universe.

I’ve explained the mathematical probability issue. I think the probability of God having created the universe is as close to zero as makes no odds, because he is a fictional character.

But, if you want to play it that way, I’ll give you the proof you request, once you’ve proved to me that the probability of the universe being created by God is more than the probablility of it being created by Hubert.

Read the first paragraph of every post that I’ve made over the last week or so. You know how I’ve been saying things along the lines of “don’t panic if I fail to address something, I don’t have time at the moment, but I’ll come back and review the thread and address anything that I’ve not addressed here”? Well, as a professional semiologist, I expect that you’ll be able to derive meaning from this system of signs and crack this enigmatic code to determine what I’m trying to say with it.

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I’m sorry, Trollface, but I really don’t see anything to reply to in your posts regarding the scribbles, dots and lines, as I can find nothing substansive there at all. I can’t really reply, because I don’t see that your posts are actually saying anything at all.

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Re: Cookbook for Creation

The fracus isnt necessarily regarding Gods existence Modus. It is the search for the essences of creation to possibly find what components exist to utilize for any time shifting endeavors. Also as mentione dbefore, even though God seems to be a focus of our debates, this exercise also is quite a learning experience for all who participate.
For those who have posted and did not get a response, I humbly ask them to post again, and don’t feel as though you are being ignored.

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Re: Cookbook for Creation

The Universe was not created? Really ?

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Re: Cookbook for Creation

What I’m saying is that we derive our own meaning from symbols and signs, they have no inherant meaning in and of themselves.

The point of the “pain” example is that the collection of letters that go together in a particular order to make the word “pain” do not have anything special that makes it mean “the sensation you feel when you are hurt”. Nor do they have anything special that makes it mean “bread”. It is merely what two different cultures have decided by common, collective consent that those particular symbols in that particular order signify.

In the same way, there is nothing inherent in the number 9 that represents the genitals. You can use that particular numeral to symbolise it, if you wish, just as you can use the letters that make up the word “genitals”, but there is still no inherant meaning other than that which you give it.

Or, to give another example, you can have the representation of the Tree Of Life and the way that atom structures are represented (but not actually physically are) and you can attatch significance to the percieved comparison. But it is you attatching that significance, it does not make the significance inherant nor unquestionable. Personally I believe that the numerals “6” and “9” resemble each other more closely than the Tree Of Life and the representations of atoms do, but I do not believe that that makes them representations of the same thing, or that it means that there is special significance attatched to this form.

You can use the Tree Of Life to represent the human body, or to represent a journey of spiritual growth (just as some use the 12 step plan) and scientists can use the representations of atomic structure to represent atomic structure. And we, as modern, Western humans can use the symbols “6” and “9” to represent specific concepts. But it is we who give them their meaning and we who created these representations.

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Re: Cookbook for Creation

"As far as I’m concerned, in order to create you need to be selfaware. "

So are you then saying that individual human cells are self-aware? For they certainly do create. I think self-awareness is much broader than us humans typically consider, because we always use ourselves as a measuring stick. If your pet is self-aware, why not an amoeba? BTW, I do agree with your statement above, and I do believe our cells are self-aware.

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Re: Cookbook for Creation

It’s hardly compelling evidence. It’s hardly the product of a high standard of evidence. And it’s hardly free from sloppy thinking.

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Re: Cookbook for Creation

Excellent point Azkaban. This also brings up the question as to where awareness begins, and where does it end. One of the premises of most philosophies of an esoteric nature is that all things have some level of awareness.

436

It's all rigged and they're criminals.

In order for man to create, then he would have to have full possession of his DNA faculties, aside from a said tampering, by said Dracks?

The Pleiadeans have been farming us for what?, thousands of years and they know this and cant do anything…

Seems like a racket to me.

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Re: Cookbook for Creation

had a dream about you this morning Trollface. Can’t remember much of it, but I do remember three photographs. The first two, well, ok…I don’t remember those either. The third one I remember very disctinctly.
You were standing with two people. An older gentleman, maybe about early sixties, and a younger chap about 4,5 or six. I am terrible at guessing someones age, and have paid the penalties in the past for inaccurate guesses. Wish women didnt grow their nails so long, ouch!
You were standing next to the older man who was somewhat husky and overweight, not overall, but kind of like he enjoyed the fruits of life a little too much. He had white hair, and kind of a round face. The younger boy had dark brown hair, almost the same length as the older man. The older man was about 4-5 inches shorter than you, the boy came up to just below your hip.
You were standing next to the older mans left and had your right hand on his shoulder, your left hand was on the left shoulder of the boy. This kind of indicates the position of all of you in the picture. You were somewhat to the left and a tad behind the older man, and the boy was in front of you to your left side. Almost directly below your left shoulder. All of you were smiling and your eyes hinted at you being family or very close. The older man had on a white summer coat and white pants. The boy had a dark blue? shirt and similar colored pants.

Just thought I would pass this by you to see if it rings any bells.

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Re: Cookbook for Creation

I’ve never denied it either, but you seemed to think so. I think we’ve made our points clear and we agree that one needs to be selfaware in order to create.

Energy is a requirement to create, you even said so yourself. I agree that “I am energy” but I am substantially different from a rock or a plant. The way I am constructed, makes me a human being. Therefore I am selfaware. A rock is not selfaware, yet it consists of energy.

I think I’ve shown on multiple occasions that your assumption - that energy is self aware - is based on an erroneous deduction. You already want me to provide negative proof for the non-existence of god and now you’re asking me to provide negative proof of yet another statement you seem unable to prove?

I was under the assumption that I had - at least - a basic understanding of The Second Law of Thermodynamics. I guess I was wrong, since I haven’t the foggiest idea how my statement violates it. Please enlighten me.

Meanwhile I’ll try to explain what I meant: I think it’s highly unlikely that human creations will have the same degree of organization and order we find in our universe. I will, however, agree to the fact that the best creations are often those designed with the golden section in mind. However, I can deliberately make something that defies the golden section, because I am selfaware.

No actually I was curious about your opinion. Honestly I haven’t made my mind up about it. My father always used to say (and still does sometimes): “There are two kinds of people in the world. Those who make a mess and those who clean it up”. Superfluous to say that, according to him, I did not belong to the latter )

However, the fact that we are selfaware makes it possible for some to create chaos and others to create order.

  1. I think it’s, once again, a bad comparison. Where in nature can we find an object that remotely resembles crystal stemware? The universe and stemware are two totally different things. Which is perfectly logical, since stemware is a creation and the universe is not.

  2. When we look at nature, we see that plants and flowers arise as a result of several random events. There are several ways the seeds of the plant can be transported from one place to another, e.g. insects, wind, water, etc. In my opinion, this is an indication that a flower is not a creation, but the result of a series of random events. I guess Bob Ross would call it: happy little accidents… even though he looked like a pretty religious type to me )

  3. Why do you think the universe was created by selfaware energy, while it obviously takes more than pure energy to create relatively simple objects like stemware.

Bullocks! AGAIN I admit that I can’t proof that god does not exist. In my opinion I’ve given enough arguments why I think the universe was not created.

In previous posts you’ve asked me for:

  1. proof of the fact god does not exist;
  2. proof of why I think the universe was not created.

Both are requests for negative proof. Period.

I never claimed there is evidence for that. There is no evidence to proof both our statements. You claim to have a definite answer to how our universe came to being, so the onus of proof is on you. I have provided arguments why I think the evidence you provide is insufficient.

On a slightly brighter tone I would like to say that the way you phrased the question this time is not a request for negative proof

Ah, there’s my answer already Just to clarify things for me a bit more… How does this imply that the universe did not arise by accident?

Okay, now let me see if there’s a beer left in the fridge

Cheers!

Roel

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Re: Cookbook for Creation

Is this something I should reply to? If so, I herewith reply.

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Re: Cookbook for Creation

Not necessary. Your comment just has me wondering that if the Universe was not created, then all that is contained within it sure seems to have some consistency. Pretty good for an illusion that never was created.