Scott Free,
I really like Richard Dawkins' stand on religion. It resonates with my own. But I began to see in the clip on enemies of reason a rigidness that is endemic in science. Science is a new religion. Its commonality is steeped in black or white. Neither seems capable of perceiving gray areas.
My perceptions of spirituality are based on the science of quantum physics and mechanics. I believe that we are spiritual beings because science cannot find material, just energy. That energy is intelligent; has a consciousness, is creative and is the basis of what we perceive as reality. But physical reality, as we see it, is nothing more than a belief system that has been refined over many millennium by our exclusive focus on material reality.
That is the problem I have with most scientists. They only focuses on the material and fail to consider the intelligent energy behind it: that props it up.
A rock may seem solid, but it is made up of atomic structures that are almost entirely made up of empty space.
The energy that holds together the neutrons and protons that make up that rock have a certain intelligence required to accomplish that task.
On the other hand, scientists "see" only the material structure because they focus entirely on observable evidence. They can't see the energy that holds it together and therefore ignore it, except when they get into the quantum aspects of particle colliders.
Scott Free,
I guess what I am getting at is that if you or I were not conscious beings, we would be nothing but masses of protoplasm. It takes "intelligence" or consciousness to be human. I am suggesting that it also takes some form of intelligence to be a tree or a rock. Something holds it together. Some call it god, I call it intelligence. You might call it something else. I think the problem is semantics.
I don't know if you have ever experienced seeing the energy of a living thing like a tree. There are various ways to attain such vision (meditation, yoga, certain drugs) but it not an uncommon occurrence. In that frame of mind, one can experience a state of oneness with the object. In that state, the "intelligence" is perceived, felt, experienced... add your own definition. Rocks can be experienced in the same way.
One must be able to break free of the restrictions of status quo thinking in order to see beyond the "normal" to what is hidden from view by restrictive belief systems.
I am suggesting that it also takes some form of intelligence to be a tree or a rock. Something holds it together. Some call it god, I call it intelligence. You might call it something else. I think the problem is semantics.
I call it the strong and weak interactions together with electromagnetism and gravitation.
Therein lies the problem. If your going to say its gravity then why not just say it's god? Since you don't know what gravity is then you cannot say it isn't. You want proof of God - then look to gravity! There is God and there is your proof!
Don't get me wrong I don't think there is a god, I'm just saying we have been lucky on this forum that the religionists are not better at argument but that does not mean we can rely on the same superstition.
I disagree...gravity can be demonstrated in a controlled test environment, god cannot...
We know gravity exists, and how and why it works...
Just because we can't see it all around us with the naked eye does not mean that we must use faith to determine it's validity...
But you just said you did demonstrate it?
No we don't! We know that it exists and that it works. The why and how is not known.
This is where I very much agree with Cliffy and see similarity to religion and science in that both make presumptions. I know science would argue its presumptions are better but I would argue that they aren't really aware of all the presumptions they have made so science doesn't really know if theirs are better or not.
What?
Where?
So we don't know that gravity is the force that exists between two bodies of different mass, and that the effect is greater when the differnce of mass is greater?
While there are some tricky questions about gravity that have yet to be answered fully, it's the best model we have for explaining the nature of bodies of mass in our universe...
This follows creationism into the hollow pit of pseudoscience, and neither serve to increase our understanding of the universe...
You are trying to answer questions on the basis of possibility rather than probability...
"gravity can be demonstrated in a controlled test environment"
Equations for a falling body near the surface of the Earth
Ball falling freely under gravity. See text for description.
Main article: Equations for a falling body
Under an assumption of constant gravity, Newton’s law of gravitation simplifies to F = mg, where m is the mass of the body and g is a constant vector with an average magnitude of 9.81 m/s². The acceleration due to gravity is equal to this g. An initially-stationary object which is allowed to fall freely under gravity drops a distance which is proportional to the square of the elapsed time. The image on the right, spanning half a second, was captured with a stroboscopic flash at 20 flashes per second. During the first 1/20th of a second the ball drops one unit of distance (here, a unit is about 12 mm); by 2/20ths it has dropped at total of 4 units; by 3/20ths, 9 units and so on.
Under the same constant gravity assumptions, the potential energy, Ep, of a body at height h is given by Ep = mgh (or Ep = Wh, with W meaning weight). This expression is valid only over small distances h from the surface of the Earth. Similarly, the expressionfor the maximum height reached by a vertically projected body with velocity v is useful for small heights and small initial velocities only. In case of large initial velocities we have to use the principle of conservation of energy to find the maximum height reached. This same expression can be solved for v to determine the velocity of an object dropped from a height h immediately before hitting the ground,, assuming negligible air resistance.
That isn't "what" it is.
That's right "a model," which is very different than saying what it is - which we don't know.
Pseudoscience you say? How so? Because I am speculating on a different model away from that which is established in wikipedia!!! OH THE HERESY!!! I blasphemed! Next I'll be saying Einstein and Plato were wrong! Just who do I think I am!!!!!!!
I know exactly what I am doing. A person just has to find a few errors and come up with a better theory and possibility becomes probability.
Oh? Are you suggesting Newton was wrong?
The gravitational model is well established, meaning that we do know what it is and how it works...we wouldn't have any idea of particle physics without knowing this.
Is it time to up your meds Scott?
If this is your goal, I suggest you read a bit more, and stop trying to find intelligence in inanimate objects...
No, I'm saying you're wrong. Newton said gravity was a force like no other. You're saying you know that it exists which means therefore that you know what it is, and that is wrong - you don't know.
ad hominem already? I have shaken your faith that easily?
Maybe you should try reading what I posted. You'll see that I made no such claim.
Hardly, you were just being a dick...
So you're agreeing with Cliffy in principle, but not in practice...I get that...
Still doesn't excuse you from denying science that we already know...
There is no faith involved in gravity...just a lot of math, without which we never would have been able to calculate escape velocity for any of the NASA launches...
If gravitons are proved by the Hadron collider then we will know the model is correct and what gravity is. If they are not then the topic will still be open for debate.