circumstantial evidence to Gods existence

[meghanwaterlillies]

Then it either means nothing (if no new growth of limb) or there is a mysterious growth of limb. Do you know of any such cases? Is it unreasonable to assume that a fair amount of time has been wasted in such prayer with no cases of regrowth?

who says they have to WASTE much time at all.
Meaning no one has to show you particularly right?

 

[meghanwaterlillies]

How quickly a world can stop and doesn't mean you have too die or something

 

[QuestioningMind]

That isn't quite true; I'll bet you have seen your mother bake a pie, or your father build a fence or some such contrivance. Organization is a sign of intelligence at work. Now if you are talking creation out of nothing, then I am with you 100%.

I OBSERVED my mother bake the pie. I OBSERVED my father build the fence. I've yet to OBSERVE God's hand in the creation of anything. I'm simply told by theists that the universe IS, therefor it MUST have been created by God.

Oh, and the only people I ever hear talking about the universe being created out of nothing are theists. The BBT suggests that EVERYTHING was at one time compressed in a singularity. Much the same way all of the vast energy from a nuclear explosion can be contained within a single microscopic atom.

 

[Katzpur]

Sorry Charlie. "0)

It's the Seventh-day Adventists, who live an average of 10 years longer than the American life expectancy of about 79 years.Jul 31, 2014
What Seventh-Day Adventists Get Right That Lengthens Their Life ...
Huffington Post › entry

The Seventh Day Adventists may have a longer than average life expectancy, but so do the Mormons. It doesn't have to be one or the other.

 

[Guy Threepwood]

Mark your calendars folks.
On this I agree with @Guy Threepwood.

Well that's no fun!

 

[Guy Threepwood]

But Guy claims to know how likely it is.

I, on the other hand, claim that we have no where near enough data to even begin to speculate.

Who is it you agree with again?

The math concurs with the observation, or lack thereof re. ET.

True, we still don't know what all the hurdles to sentient life are on other planets, but we have more than enough to make it rather improbable in such a limited space

 

[Guy Threepwood]

I will let him speak for himself. But that isn't the impression I have gotten.
What he seems to have said is "Claims that the universe must have other life forms and civilizations are not fact based claims. They are wishful thinking given what little we know. "
I could be wrong about his opinion.
Tom

I think we agree that, 'new Eathlike planet found!!' is a little misleading, you give up reading past those headlines after a few dozen- one of the most promising Gliese system candidates, turned out not to exist at all. These are after all largely based on perceived periodic dimming of stars, which can be caused by many things and tell you very little about what's causing it.

we are all familiar with the Sagan-esque sequences panning out from our pale blue dot, to show 'billions and billions' of stars, with a dubbed over narration about how arrogant it is, to think there is anything special about Earth..
but the cold hard math says otherwise

There are billions of people on Earth, yet we only have to list a handful of mundane idiosyncrasies before we may be identified as utterly unique, because each improbability compounds the rest

The list of idiosyncrasies which are utterly crucial for complex, let alone sentient life on Earth, is neither short nor mundane, and is ever growing. Compound these together and you exceed the number of stars in the universe very easily.

And the math is reflected in the observation, the 'great silence' of the galaxy.

 

[sayak83]

I think we agree that, 'new Eathlike planet found!!' is a little misleading, you give up reading past those headlines after a few dozen- one of the most promising Gliese system candidates, turned out not to exist at all. These are after all largely based on perceived periodic dimming of stars, which can be caused by many things and tell you very little about what's causing it.

we are all familiar with the Sagan-esque sequences panning out from our pale blue dot, to show 'billions and billions' of stars, with a dubbed over narration about how arrogant it is, to think there is anything special about Earth..
but the cold hard math says otherwise

There are billions of people on Earth, yet we only have to list a handful of mundane idiosyncrasies before we may be identified as utterly unique, because each improbability compounds the rest

The list of idiosyncrasies which are utterly crucial for complex, let alone sentient life on Earth, is neither short nor mundane, and is ever growing. Compound these together and you exceed the number of stars in the universe very easily.

And the math is reflected in the observation, the 'great silence' of the galaxy.

Evidence less opinions continue..
Why would anybody beam anything. All stars are far apart and light speed is max. Since hyper drives do not actually exist there is no travel or interstellar civs. Sorry.

 

[Twilight Hue]

The Seventh Day Adventists may have a longer than average life expectancy, but so do the Mormons. It doesn't have to be one or the other.

I was just poking a little fun at it. :0)

I'm figuring the dietary habits has a lot to do with longevity and general health. It makes for a good example for others to follow.

 

[RedDragon94]

Hi,

As many times the strongest argument for theism is:

Don't expect to measure God as it is immeasurable.

On another post, a fellow debater suggested I'l discuss God's existence while being open to accept circumstantial evidence as a valid proof for a God.



So I find this advice very useful and would love to hear about a different kind of evidence.

I apologize in advance, as i assume it will be hard for me to understand at times, so i will probably "nag" with questions.

Cheers

The thing about it is circumstances change, one day it seems like there is a God and another day it seems like there isn't. The Christian Theist will say that God reveals himself through circumstance, but I ask do circumstances reveal that God has their best interest at heart.

 

[Guy Threepwood]

Evidence less opinions continue..
Why would anybody beam anything. All stars are far apart and light speed is max. Since hyper drives do not actually exist there is no travel or interstellar civs. Sorry.

Thanks for noticing, evidence, less opinion is always my preference.

Just one civilization, with tech. little better than ours, could have colonized the entire galaxy many times over by now. But, ancient alien theories not withstanding, this has never happened.

Why not?

 

[columbus]

Just one civilization, with tech. little better than ours, could have colonized the entire galaxy many times over by now. But, ancient alien theories not withstanding, this has never happened.

Why not?

Possibly sentient life, like humans, is just not sustainable.
We have not been around long, by geological standards. But we are on a collision path with our own destruction. And we will likely take out all the major species that might develop sentience in the foreseeable future if the biosphere collapses.
I don't think humans are, as a group, smart enough to head that off. That would also explain the silence from the galaxy.
Tom

 

[sayak83]

Thanks for noticing, evidence, less opinion is always my preference.

Just one civilization, with tech. little better than ours, could have colonized the entire galaxy many times over by now. But, ancient alien theories not withstanding, this has never happened.

Why not?

How exactly?
No massive object can travel anymore than a fraction of the speed of light. The cost of sustaining colonies in planets hundreds of light years away when travel times in the best case scenario will be hundreds or thousands of years is too prohibitive. They will colonize their own solar system and maybe build telescopes etc. to see to other places, but that would be it. The hundreds and thousands of years time lag for communication signals will also make any interplanetary communication impossible. Relativity Is a bummer.

 

[divine lover]

Hi,

As many times the strongest argument for theism is:

Don't expect to measure God as it is immeasurable.

On another post, a fellow debater suggested I'l discuss God's existence while being open to accept circumstantial evidence as a valid proof for a God.



So I find this advice very useful and would love to hear about a different kind of evidence.

I apologize in advance, as i assume it will be hard for me to understand at times, so i will probably "nag" with questions.

Cheers

How about the fact that DNA encodes biological information? This implies a code writer. Or the irreducible complexity of flagellum? This implies the mechanism was designed to work as a whole rather than parts miraculously co-operating to perform a function after the fact.

 

[Guy Threepwood]

Possibly sentient life, like humans, is just not sustainable.
We have not been around long, by geological standards. But we are on a collision path with our own destruction. And we will likely take out all the major species that might develop sentience in the foreseeable future if the biosphere collapses.
I don't think humans are, as a group, smart enough to head that off. That would also explain the silence from the galaxy.
Tom

Malthus! but I'm glad we are back to disagreeing again,,

kinda like the Europeans colonizing the Americas thread- the biosphere was destroying itself before humans arrived, we are saving it from itself in the nick of time I believe, all part of the plan I think..

Hawking sees it as man's destiny to colonize the stars, and I think agrees with you, that we are doomed otherwise.. and so again if just ONE other civilization achieved colonizing ONE other system/planet- it would be well on it's way to the whole galaxy. Its arguably a rather modest goal compared with bacteria colonizing all of our planet

 

[columbus]

the biosphere was destroying itself before humans arrived, we are saving it from itself in the nick of time I believe, all part of the plan I think..

Can you explain these three assertions? I don't follow any of them, much less how they relate to the Genocide of the Americas.
Tom

 

[Guy Threepwood]

How exactly?
No massive object can travel anymore than a fraction of the speed of light. The cost of sustaining colonies in planets hundreds of light years away when travel times in the best case scenario will be hundreds or thousands of years is too prohibitive. They will colonize their own solar system and maybe build telescopes etc. to see to other places, but that would be it. The hundreds and thousands of years time lag for communication signals will also make any interplanetary communication impossible. Relativity Is a bummer.

about 10% is feasible with our technology, putting our nearest stars within a single lifetime- and probably better odds of reaching them alive than Columbus had of crossing the Atlantic.

but consider that we figured out powered flight barely more than a single lifetime ago,- then walked on the moon a few short decades later... and have probes beyond our solar system already- early days for us.

The galaxy has been around for billions of years, but is only 100KLY across, meaning there has been plenty time, even at a very slow pace, to cover it all many times over. The relativity also means that we could pick up past signals we'd otherwise miss. So in terms of the odds of scoring a 'hit'- it's a wash- exactly the same as listening to the entire galaxy at once.- and still nada

Cryogenics could also make those timescales redundant, frogs can do it- not inherently beyond our capacity- or that of intelligent alien frogs perhaps?!

 

[columbus]

Hawking sees it as man's destiny to colonize the stars, and I think agrees with you, that we are doomed otherwise..

I don't care what Hawking thinks. If we can't manage the world we evolved to be suited on, colonizing the stars would be the equivalent of a viral infection to the galaxy.
Fortunately for the galaxy I don't think we will manage it anyway without improving a great deal morally.
Tom

 

[Guy Threepwood]

Can you explain these three assertions? I don't follow any of them, much less how they relate to the Genocide of the Americas.
Tom

Most life appeared with atmospheric CO2 levels vastly higher than today, 7000ppm + in the cambrian..

Over millions of years, plants consumed and buried this vital resource, down to a scant 270ppm pre-industrial, a virtual starvation level that helped open up vast deserts that used to be lush.

We are recycling a tiny fraction of this spent resource (among others) back into the biosphere. The rapid re-greening of the planet in the last 100 years is something we might look for in other planets as a sign of technological life also. Mother nature would thanks us for this green recycling program!

 

[Guy Threepwood]

I don't care what Hawking thinks. If we can't manage the world we evolved to be suited on, colonizing the stars would be the equivalent of a viral infection to the galaxy.
Fortunately for the galaxy I don't think we will manage it anyway without improving a great deal morally.
Tom

I'm on the fence on that one, the Bible talks about humanity becoming as numerous as the stars- which it also correctly compares to the number of grains of sand.. which would require colonization you would think.. but I tend to think this whole story is going to be concluded before that sort of timescale..