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  1. halbhh

    Are we saved by our own efforts or are we saved by God's efforts ?

    That's 100% right. And there is more, more than only what you listed. Something crucial, Life or Death: The Vine and the Branches 15 “I am the true vine, and my Father is the gardener. 2 He cuts off every branch in me that bears no fruit, while every branch that does bear fruit he prunes so...
  2. halbhh

    Are we saved by our own efforts or are we saved by God's efforts ?

    That wonderful John 5:24 verse, but it's not necessarily many that do that: "he who hears My word" -- to actually seek to listen to all that Christ said for us to hear! Or even to be well on the way, even. Not many do that it seems. (It isn't just reading/listening to a few things Christ said...
  3. halbhh

    Are we saved by our own efforts or are we saved by God's efforts ?

    You have set up that question wonderfully, well. And, Wonderfully Christ continues in that passage to tell us just that answer: 24 “Therefore everyone who hears these words of mine and puts them into practice is like a wise man who built his house on the rock. 25 The rain came down, the...
  4. halbhh

    Why do you think it's wrong for someone else to be gay?

    As you may have heard already, there isn't anything wrong with any temperament. Rather, we all have good and evil in us, and everyone does wrongs at times in life, no matter their temperament, and of course using my temperament I might well tend to fall into some various wrongs that are easier...
  5. halbhh

    Theists: What would a godless universe look like?

    Precisely my own attitude. Sure, we can summarize a lot of detail on current theories, but in the end, it's about evidence. That's a main part of why I was pointing out how pragmatically useful and indispensable testability is for a theory (via Karl Popper) -- it helps to allow us to make...
  6. halbhh

    Theists: What would a godless universe look like?

    Interesting. That's one reason some think of a more advanced intelligence out there -- some thinking life and the Universe must exist for a reason.
  7. halbhh

    Theists: What would a godless universe look like?

    Ah pessimistic there. While Mars actually seems marginal today, perhaps with some very radical process of increasing the atmosphere (redirecting comets to impact Mars might be one useful thing), it could become more interesting. But also we seem likely to have breakthroughs in physics and...
  8. halbhh

    Theists: What would a godless universe look like?

    Why is that you think? After all, there are many bodies in our solar system big enough, > 60miles in diameter. This is old stuff for me from decades ago, and you might know it, but it's because we have Jupiter and Saturn to help vacuum up comets of the kind that would tend to intersect Earth's...
  9. halbhh

    Theists: What would a godless universe look like?

    That would merely make the Universe itself 'Eternal' and then...well, perhap you just merely then have 'God by another name'. And we could imagine other possibilities, like having some advanced civilization that survives the cycles or seeds through them, etc. If the Universe turns out to be...
  10. halbhh

    Theists: What would a godless universe look like?

    A very interesting view! (I'll leave aside for now why it is (from astronomy articles) I'm expecting that natural phenomena would routinely sterilize planets of life) So, in view of your idea...then you'd then expect that say...within 100 or 300 ly from here, we could one day (many centuries...
  11. halbhh

    Theists: What would a godless universe look like?

    Ah, according to the common bible, God made like himself (though of course while He is at least billions of years old (or much more perhaps), we are merely like 30 or 50 or 70 and such, relatively more like a toddler (at most).
  12. halbhh

    Theists: What would a godless universe look like?

    Ah, well, assuming the opposite seems...less plausible, actually, and you'll be laughing when you see it (it's just something you already know since long ago no doubt) -- if we are made of matter and have consciousness, then it follows of course that matter elsewhere could have consciousness...
  13. halbhh

    Theists: What would a godless universe look like?

    :) Well, if as we were suggesting above, both of us in different wordings, if the 'supernatural' and the 'natural' are the same thing (e.g. if the supernatural is just natural things we don't yet understand, etc.)...then...that question is already answered. But on the other hand, it's also...
  14. halbhh

    Theists: What would a godless universe look like?

    It's from Karl Popper, and not antique at all.
  15. halbhh

    Theists: What would a godless universe look like?

    The preference for having theories that are testable -- theories that make predictions on not yet observed phenomena that can be checked on someday, in time... ...so that it's possible that theory might be found to be false by observations... --> theories that are "falsifiable" as Karl Popper...
  16. halbhh

    Theists: What would a godless universe look like?

    Ah, I didn't include that in that post, but I'm of the view that God had chosen or worked to modify or originate the design of this physics which causes this Universe (as I think S. Hawking said, the Universe is merely (only) physics in action). (e.g., creating this Universe (this particular...
  17. halbhh

    Theists: What would a godless universe look like?

    Ah! I see. As you know, in physics we are assuming a causality in some sense: that the future state is caused by the current state and the operation of nature ("physics") in some way we know partly about, but far from completely yet. (This is related to what you are talking about tho!) Ergo...
  18. halbhh

    Are we saved by our own efforts or are we saved by God's efforts ?

    That's very easy -- God's efforts. A great analogy, and one that Christ also used -- we are (to be) like little children. In fact He said we must change and become like little children or else we cannot make it into heaven! (Matthew 18).... We do have legs and an ability to hold our...
  19. halbhh

    Theists: What would a godless universe look like?

    We agree a lot! I'd myself word it that the 'natural' and the 'supernatural' can often be a kind of made up dichotomy, at least in many aspects. Natural is really something. Of course, as many on both side of arguments often can agree, sometimes what is called 'supernatural' turns out to...
  20. halbhh

    Theists: What would a godless universe look like?

    Ah, well, perhaps existence itself then has a personality? It's not that we could say one way or the other just from that alone. There is the classic old idea of panpsychism, which is sorta similar. We'd not (or I'd not) try to suggest that matter is as a whole (in large quantity or such)...
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