Does the universe need intelligence to order it?

[Thief]

As another human who lives in the wilderness miles away from streetlamps and lights I can concur.

so you have seen.....'country' dark?

 

[Thief]

As for the Light of the universe.....Someone had to be First.

 

[rrosskopf]

Thirdly, if one posits that they rely on "spiritual matters", what exactly is "spiritual", and how does one ascertain that it even exists if it cannot be observed?

It can be observed, or at least witnessed. In science, we can't really see a single proton or electron; we "see" them by watching their interaction with other things. Direct visual observation is nice, but it isn't the only source of knowledge. Gravity is the same way. We can't see gravity, but we can see the result of gravity. We can't "see" dark matter, but scientists believe it exists because they can tell that the seen universe isn't enough to account for the gravity. To proclaim the existence of a spirit world, that cannot be seen, is no different than proclaiming the existence of Dark Matter, which cannot be seen.

The real question then, is how does the spirit world interact with the physical world. For the sake of clarity, I should mention that both are technically physical, but I will call visible matter "physical" as opposed to spiritual.
1) One way that the spiritual interacts with the physical, is through vision. There is ample testimony that people have seen, albeit occasionally, spiritual things. The actual mechanics of this type of observation is debatable, and difficult to examine scientifically.
2) Prophecy, or in other words revelation. In modern language prophecy usually references the foretelling of future events, but I am using it in the older sense of revelation from God. Whenever a man seems to get knowledge from a spiritual source, that is prophecy. There is a wealth of testimony to this occurrence as well, both in ancient times, and in modern times. We may not "see" the prophecy, but we certainly see the results. The best example, because of the sheer amount of prophecy, and also because of the wealth of modern eye-witness accounts, is the Prophet Joseph Smith. His name has become a hiss and byword, but there is no greater example of this pheonomina.
3) Signs shall follow those that believe. This is actually a subset of 2). Although the Bible tells us that it is wrong to seek a sign, as it is a show of extremely low faith, signs are still given. A sign is an unexpected and immediate demonstration of prophecy.
4) Gift of tongues. This much maligned gift is commonly faked, by people who babble and call it language, despite no obvious transference of information. Never-the-less, the real thing also happens, where people who have never learned French, suddenly speak French. There are both ancient and modern examples.
5) The Gift of Oratory. I'm not sure what else to call it. There are numerous examples of people who are not public speakers - that is to say they have not been taught to speak in public, and have poor language skills, but suddenly can speak artfully and with great persuasion, without any preparation. "It shall be given you in that very hour what ye shall say..."
6) The Gift of Healing. There are numerous accounts of phony healers, but there are also numerous accounts of people whose medical diagnosis has been completely reversed after a faith healing.
7) Commanding the elements. This is very rare, but again there are both ancient and modern examples, mostly involving severe weather.
8) NDE's, or Near Death Experiences. It is estimated that hundred of thousands of people in the US alone have experienced some type of near death experience.
9) Memories from before birth. There are many cases of children who seem to have memories from before they were born. The memories usually, but not always, are erased by around 4 or 5 years of age. The memories are of a pre-earth life, in a spirit world. These don't seem to be as common as NDE's, but that is difficult to measure as I am not aware of any scientific studies or surveys that investigate this pheonomina.

There are probably other examples that I have left out. Feel free to add to the list. Each of these categories could be expanded substantially, as books have been written about most if not all of them.

 

[Midnight Rain]

I sometimes wish I did too! I've developed an interest in astronomy and now have a telescope, but there is quite a lot of light pollution where I live which does tend to limit things. It is fascinating though.

I got a telescope last Christmas from my parents and it has been pretty neat. I sometimes get light pollution from the local town but usually it isn't bad. Stargazing is a good hobby in my opinion.

 

[Midnight Rain]

so you have seen.....'country' dark?

You'll have to clarify what you mean.

 

[Thief]

It can be observed, or at least witnessed. In science, we can't really see a single proton or electron; we "see" them by watching their interaction with other things. Direct visual observation is nice, but it isn't the only source of knowledge. Gravity is the same way. We can't see gravity, but we can see the result of gravity. We can't "see" dark matter, but scientists believe it exists because they can tell that the seen universe isn't enough to account for the gravity. To proclaim the existence of a spirit world, that cannot be seen, is no different than proclaiming the existence of Dark Matter, which cannot be seen.

Look out....several people around here will expect ...'proof'.
They're funny that way.

 

[Thief]

You'll have to clarify what you mean.

One evening, at my grandparents old house....
I turned off the yard light and the country dark snapped right up against the window of the back door.

I turned the light back on.....everything lit was familiar.
Turn it off again....all things vanished into ink black.

I dared to go out.
finding my way down the sidewalk by the feel of stone beneath my shoes....
I went all the way to the end where the green grass should be.

I could not see my hand in front of my face.
Behind me the kitchen light was the only item visible.
If I venture too far.....lost.....and blind.

 

[Rick O'Shez]

Check the Big Dipper ....see if you can spot the 'double star' in the handle.

Yes, seen it! I like looking at the Andromeda galaxy, DSOs are cool!

 

[Rick O'Shez]

Look out....several people around here will expect ...'proof'.

Some authentic personal experience would be a good start.

 

[Muffled]

So could you describe your experience of the Divine, or is it a just a belief that you have?

See the Thread "Experiencing God."

 

[Muffled]

If the universe needs intelligence to order itself than earthquakes need vibrators to rumble. The amount of logical fail in such assertions is epic

I believe that is illogical. There is a pholosphy of a prime mover but He is hardly a vibrator although I suspect He likes rithym since there is so much of it in naature.

 

[Muffled]

BS, does gravity need intelligence to know which way to fall?

I believe it doesn't but I believe the universe needs intelligence to produce the attraction of objects as opposed to chaos where things would not attract. This universe has planets attracted to stars and stars atracted to galaxies. It is well ordered that way.

 

[Midnight Rain]

It can be observed, or at least witnessed. In science, we can't really see a single proton or electron; we "see" them by watching their interaction with other things. Direct visual observation is nice, but it isn't the only source of knowledge. Gravity is the same way. We can't see gravity, but we can see the result of gravity. We can't "see" dark matter, but scientists believe it exists because they can tell that the seen universe isn't enough to account for the gravity. To proclaim the existence of a spirit world, that cannot be seen, is no different than proclaiming the existence of Dark Matter, which cannot be seen.

I can see certain things trying to be understood. For example on the one had I wish that Magic could be done in a double blind study but the essence of magic would be disrupted by such a study. However that means I have to understand it in a subjective way. But this also means that I don't go around making claims of truth about these aspects of my spirituality and I usually don't make an attempt to get people to believe me. Either they have an interest or not.

The real question then, is how does the spirit world interact with the physical world. For the sake of clarity, I should mention that both are technically physical, but I will call visible matter "physical" as opposed to spiritual.

Visible is a bad way to say it as well for the record. But lets take a crack at this list with scrutiny shall we?

1) One way that the spiritual interacts with the physical, is through vision. There is ample testimony that people have seen, albeit occasionally, spiritual things. The actual mechanics of this type of observation is debatable, and difficult to examine scientifically.

This is similar to magic. However it is not verifiable and therefore not evidence.

2) Prophecy, or in other words revelation. In modern language prophecy usually references the foretelling of future events, but I am using it in the older sense of revelation from God. Whenever a man seems to get knowledge from a spiritual source, that is prophecy. There is a wealth of testimony to this occurrence as well, both in ancient times, and in modern times. We may not "see" the prophecy, but we certainly see the results. The best example, because of the sheer amount of prophecy, and also because of the wealth of modern eye-witness accounts, is the Prophet Joseph Smith. His name has become a hiss and byword, but there is no greater example of this pheonomina.

There are no known prophecies that have been anything but vague or self fulfilling. I have seen hundreds of claims of prophecy but there were all manor of subjective interpretations of the original prophecy in order to match the actual event. So it is entirely conceivable that it was not an actual prophecy but simply coincidence or wishful thinking. So again not evidence

3) Signs shall follow those that believe. This is actually a subset of 2). Although the Bible tells us that it is wrong to seek a sign, as it is a show of extremely low faith, signs are still given. A sign is an unexpected and immediate demonstration of prophecy.

Its also a great way to claim no true Scotsman. But what are some of these "signs" and are they impossible otherwise?

4) Gift of tongues. This much maligned gift is commonly faked, by people who babble and call it language, despite no obvious transference of information. Never-the-less, the real thing also happens, where people who have never learned French, suddenly speak French. There are both ancient and modern examples.

Firstly there have been several studies on the speaking of tongues and no such actual language can be found. It sounds like and in reality is, a bunch of jibberish. Secondly there are no recorded or verified event of someone suddenly speaking another language with no training.

5) The Gift of Oratory. I'm not sure what else to call it. There are numerous examples of people who are not public speakers - that is to say they have not been taught to speak in public, and have poor language skills, but suddenly can speak artfully and with great persuasion, without any preparation. "It shall be given you in that very hour what ye shall say..."

I don't see how this is actually a gift. Being good at speaking in public can happen without training. It happens impromptu all the time. The first time I had spoken in front of a large crowd I had never had any training and never had any real articulation skills. However I did fine and was even praised.

6) The Gift of Healing. There are numerous accounts of phony healers, but there are also numerous accounts of people whose medical diagnosis has been completely reversed after a faith healing.

There are zero confirmed faith healing cases. There are several claimed faith healing cases and the only ones that have ever even been slightly compelling was the ones with cancer. Why is this compelling? At first glance there are several cases of cancer going into remission for no observable reason. So therefore it must have been god. I mean they went to faith healing and everything! However cancer can sometimes go into remission for no reason. This is part of the mystery with cancer. And if we had a person doing faith healings and 100% or hell even 50% of his healing results were sucessful then we could look at it. But people that go to faith healing don't consistently get better. I had an Aunt who had stage 4 cancer. She went exclusively to faith healing for a man who had supposedly 'healed" several people. She died in less than a month. So I don't even take kindly to these kinds of claims.

7) Commanding the elements. This is very rare, but again there are both ancient and modern examples, mostly involving severe weather.

Name a modern example.

8) NDE's, or Near Death Experiences. It is estimated that hundred of thousands of people in the US alone have experienced some type of near death experience.

These are interesting but hardly evidence. i have my own personal opinions about them but I shall keep them to myself for the purposes of this debate.

9) Memories from before birth. There are many cases of children who seem to have memories from before they were born. The memories usually, but not always, are erased by around 4 or 5 years of age. The memories are of a pre-earth life, in a spirit world. These don't seem to be as common as NDE's, but that is difficult to measure as I am not aware of any scientific studies or surveys that investigate this pheonomina.

There have been. Found two in under a minute after googling it. But none have come up with anything close to conclusive.

 

[Midnight Rain]

One evening, at my grandparents old house....
I turned off the yard light and the country dark snapped right up against the window of the back door.

I turned the light back on.....everything lit was familiar.
Turn it off again....all things vanished into ink black.

I dared to go out.
finding my way down the sidewalk by the feel of stone beneath my shoes....
I went all the way to the end where the green grass should be.

I could not see my hand in front of my face.
Behind me the kitchen light was the only item visible.
If I venture too far.....lost.....and blind.

ah. Well actually if you go outside at night even under a new moon you can still see. I've gone for walks in the woods at night a few times without flashlights. I don't venture into paths that I don't know well or if its dangerous, but your eyes adjust.

 

[Thief]

ah. Well actually if you go outside at night even under a new moon you can still see. I've gone for walks in the woods at night a few times without flashlights. I don't venture into paths that I don't know well or if its dangerous, but your eyes adjust.

I have seen the two extremes.
My grandparents house was several miles from the city.
One night was sooooooooo bright, you could read a book.
The full moon and the stars had no cover.

But the country dark was beyond getting used to.
Not a glimmer of a shadow.....nothing.....up close and personal.
No form or shape.....blind, with eyes wide open.

 

[Midnight Rain]

I have seen the two extremes.
My grandparents house was several miles from the city.
One night was sooooooooo bright, you could read a book.
The full moon and the stars had no cover.

But the country dark was beyond getting used to.
Not a glimmer of a shadow.....nothing.....up close and personal.
No form or shape.....blind, with eyes wide open.

You gotta wait then. Your eyes adjust pretty well after a while even in extreme darkness. Starlight alone can light a lot more than you think. A full moon its almost like daylight on a clear night.

 

[Thief]

You gotta wait then. Your eyes adjust pretty well after a while even in extreme darkness. Starlight alone can light a lot more than you think. A full moon its almost like daylight on a clear night.

No really.....no moon, heavy cloud cover....as in pitch black.
I've only seen it once.

 

[Midnight Rain]

No really.....no moon, heavy cloud cover....as in pitch black.
I've only seen it once.

Indeed. How long did you stay out in it?

 

[Rick O'Shez]

Your eyes adjust pretty well after a while even in extreme darkness.

Yes, it can take a while though.

 

[Rick O'Shez]

A new strategy from the "master". Note the misleading straw-man title. <sigh>

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