----- Original Message -----
From: "Zero Powers" <zero_powers@hotmail.com>
To: <extropians@extropy.org>
Sent: Monday, September 18, 2000 4:04 PM
Subject: God & stuff (was: Re: just me)
> >From: Samantha Atkins <samantha@objectent.com>
>
> >Emlyn wrote:
> > >
> > > Gods (or Godesses) aren't going to help us where we are going. Get
over
> >it.
> >
> >Don't be simplistic. I'm not, nor is this topic. Some of the impulses,
> >sentiments, feelings, ideals, ideas behind religions are also to be
> >found driving humanity in the sciences. That very desire to transcend
> >that burns so bright in all of us for instance.
> >
> >I understand it is uncomfortable to think along these lines. I
> >understand very well as I have fought with such things often in my life.
> >
> >But do not underestimate the importance of the various images of
> >Transcendence to the type of work we are embarked on.
>
> I can't imagine that any of the world religions have a lock on any sort of
> real "supernatural" ontology. But I always get kick out of atheists who
> smugly claim that there is no god. I don't claim that there is a god.
The
> fact of the matter is that the data are inconclusive. But there are some
> things we do know: the universe is here; it got here somehow; and we don't
> know how.
>
> I realize that is not reason enough to claim that it must have been built
by
> Jehovah (Allah, Jesus, fill in the blank). But some time back, before the
> big bang, before the first of perhaps almost infinitely many big bangs,
> there was a *first* cause.
>
> Energy is conserved, meaning it is neither created nor destroyed. Can
that
> mean that energy and/or matter have *always* existed? Is that any easier
to
> believe than the story that God has always existed? Not for me. Don't
get
> me wrong, I no longer believe in the God I was taught about in Sunday
> school. But in light of the number and fundamentality of the unanswerable
> questions, I can't see how one could claim with any sort of certainty that
> God does not exist.
>
>
> -Zero
>
"God does/does not exist" is an untestable hypothesis. Maybe vaguely
interesting (purely from an anthropocentric point of view), but not useful.
Maybe the answer is yes, maybe no. What's the difference. Un-ask the
question.
Emlyn
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