TWT - your point about the limits of scientific enquiry are very true indeed, will we as a species live long enough to know the answer one way or another? Honestly, i doubt it, unless we learn how to colonise another solar body soon. Maybe we will though, and maybe scientific enquiry will develop into the knowledge that The Big Bang was God, after all, science cannot even begin to touch on how so much matter in the universe came from suppsedly nothing and it's the scientific concept i have most difficulty with.
I didn't touch on it, but that's precisely my issue - everything from nothing (all matter from nothing), order out of randomness.
No, i'd never read any Kant, never even heard of him/her to be honest. My reading habits as a child were on such things as nature, astronomy, dinosaurs and they stayed the same ever since. If you can recommend his best work though i'll keep an eye out for it at Waterstone's (a UK national chain of book-shops, if it's anywhere, it'll be there).
I wouldn't suggest reading a lot of Kant (17th century philosopher) - I'm no expert on him - and his stuff is so boring and so thick it's not something you sit down with a cup of tea to read by the fire on a cold evening.
I believe Kant set out to find a middle-way between competing ideas on how to know "truth" - only using the senses (empiricists), or that we know truth by the intellect, not the senses, and that the intellect possesses its own “innate ideas.†(rationalism).
In the end he apparently gave up - his great offering to philosophy is he became the very first to decide that "truth" is subjective...All previous philosophers had assumed that truth was objective.
I do think Kant and Locke helped influence political philosophy - I think some smart guys lifted a  concept that religion should not be a tool of government to keep the governed in line, but that religion should be what guides those to whom we loan our power.
I woyuld argue a couple of points though, even the fact that you and i are having this conversation i would suggest proves that your mind can think outside of cause and effect, yours and the beleifs of 6 billion others prove it, i reckon. Unless i've misunderstood it.
Yeah, I agree - I've heard it said that God prefers an honest atheist to a dishonest theist...don't think God minds honest questioning.
Also, although yes, science is considered by the mind and dependent upon experiment, the belief that it has limitations in this way i think makes a mockery of discovery, 550 years ago the mind could only consider to earth to be flat and that the sun went round the earth, that's the most obvious example where people have thought outside of what the mind is usually thinking. Thinking beyond what we know to be true i believe is what makes science (and by science i mean specifically Physics) so interesting, String theory and theories on the multiverse would blow most people's minds.
Well, somehow man lost sight of what was in the Bible:
In Job 26:7 - The Bible describes the suspension of the Earth in space:
"He stretches out the north over empty space; He hangs the earth on nothing."
In Ecclesiastes 1:6 the Bible describes the circulation of the atmosphere:
The wind goes toward the south,
And turns around to the north;
The wind whirls about continually,
And comes again on its circuit.
In Job 28:25 the Bible includes some principles of fluid dynamics (The fact that air has "weight" was proven scientifically only about 300 years ago. The relative weights of air and water are needed for the efficient functioning of the world’s hydrologic cycle, which in turn sustains life on the earth):
To establish a weight for the wind,
And apportion the waters by measure.
Thanks to the assertion by the poster John Galt? I found something interesting regarding "biogenesis" - In Genesis the Bible describes biogenesis (the development of living organisms from other living organisms) and the stability of each kind of living organism (ok JG? you'll have to allow some license for the use of "kinds"):
Genesis 1:11,12
Then God said, “Let the earth bring forth grass, the herb that yields seed, and the fruit tree that yields fruit according to its kind, whose seed is in itself, on the earthâ€; and it was so. And the earth brought forth grass, the herb that yields seed according to its kind, and the tree that yields fruit, whose seed is in itself according to its kind. And God saw that it was good.
Genesis 1:21
So God created great sea creatures and every living thing that moves, with which the waters abounded, according to their kind, and every winged bird according to its kind. And God saw that it was good.
Genesis 1:25
And God made the beast of the earth according to its kind, cattle according to its kind, and everything that creeps on the earth according to its kind. And God saw that it was good.
(**The phrase “according to its kind†occurs repeatedly, stressing the reproductive integrity of each kind of animal and plant. Today we know this occurs because all of these reproductive systems are programmed by their genetic codes.)
In Isaiah 40:22 the Bible described the shape of the earth centuries before people thought that the earth was spherical.
It is He who sits above the circle of the earth,
And its inhabitants are like grasshoppers,
Who stretches out the heavens like a curtain,
And spreads them out like a tent to dwell in.
The Pope may have been a "flat-Earther - but the Bible was not.
Your idea about man's intelligence being such because god made it so intrigued me a lot, The ability to think laterally, communicate through complex speech and language, love, hate and so on...couldn't you argue that 'because god made it so' and 'because evolution made it possible' are pretty much the same level of argument? My contention is that some species had to be at the top of the cognitive ability tree on earth, just so happens we are that species.
I'd say there's a stark difference - in the first, my belief allows for it while evolution does not.
God specifically designed man with the capacity for higher reason, unlike animals - there simply isn't anything like it in the animal Kingdom - man's spirit yearned to know and to be known. To love and be loved...he employed the cognitive ability to describe his world, his place in it, and his desires.
I am convinced that there is some part of
every human that when he looks into sky he contemplates God.
Evolutionary theory poses something very intriguing - a process entirely devoid of any cause or purpose, acting completely randomly - but in a
completely orderly fashion - to assesses a situation, design a response to input, and commit to a path, then compares results!
Evolution as a distributed network, complete with feedback-loops, decision-trees leading to root cause analysis, corrective actions and critical paths...down-right intelligent!
...except it's not.
It just happens(?).
Simply
because something
needs to happen - it does? Not logical.
The Bible actually offers an explanation for life's origins - sly atheists
infer that higher life evolved from lower life - they even make it sound plausible that lower forms of different
kinds,
types...forms evolved
from...yet they don't admit that they
believe something they cannot prove...that ALL life came from primordial ooze, or "aliens" made it happen, or
anything but that silly
God theory...when you give me a theory that explains a process (kind-of), but you cannot describe the
origins of life - then you are using faith.
The thought of evil being a man-made invention....can't argue with that but i would also say that the whole morality scale is a man made invention. Not just the bottom end. And it's through our increased cognitive ability that generally we've been able to leave behind ideas that we can end anothers life or take what is not ours. A belief not shared by any other species on earth. So one could argue that if god is responsible that man is his favourite creature since he gave us free will, all this thinking power above any other creature as well as the potential to be moral and civil but it leaves a very big question of why?
Well, if any man is justified to create his own social standard for God's "absolute morality" - substitute
his standard for God's - that allows man to change truth - if man can change
some truth, then there isn't ANY truth.
Think about that, because that concept would allow Hitler, Lenin, and Stalin...to establish their standards. From what I've read they considered themselves very
altruistic...especially in the beginning.
I think what you describe is that if we are created, then we must have a purpose - and I think our capacity, ability and senses should follow the inspiration of our God-given intellect to discover that purpose. Â Â
In the end, there is only one
honest reason for believing anything: because it is true.
This phrase baffled me a little, "Through Christ man now has the choice to un-decide". If you believe god gave us free will then how can we un-decide something? That sounds like free will given, then taken away. 'youre allowed to do what you want...actually, no, youre not'. Can you just clarify a touch?
Christianity argues from the same premise - that the moral law does in fact come from God - therefore man is not
autonomous. Meaning, regardless of mans desire - the mere fact that he was
created makes him subject to a higher/supreme being's morality.
Man
is free to choose to obey or disobey the moral law, but he is not free to create the law itself, nor can he escape the consequences.
If you can conceive the concept of a supreme being, and that this supreme being is interventionist enough to create man - is it logical that the creation should confine the deity to
their concepts of morality?
I suggest that it would not be logical. God created man, he gave him a choice between good and evil and even told him not to choose the evil or man would be subject to dire consequences (separation from a relationship from an interventionist God). Man chose evil - but only a little bit - and when questioned he lied and blamed someone else...and it has continued. Man wants a relationship with God, God wants a relationship with man - so he becomes man in the person of Jesus Christ. That man fulfills ALL the requirements of absolute morality - and then he lays down his life for ALL men to bring them back to a relationship with God (and God with mankind). All that is required is that each man must individually acknowledge his condition for failing Gods standard (our indebted condition) - then accept Jesus Christs sacrifice as payment in full for our debt - and his leadership for our continuing life.
I didn't mean to get preachy - I just didn't want to assume that you knew the condition of man from the viewpoint of Christianity's God - because you asked about his plan to about how man can "
un-decide" - so I listed Gods process for restoration.
