| cerberus wrote on Tue, 22 April 2008 10:40 |
harland; i am confused by your words. what is "the evolutionary period"?
chris; many may not agree with the article's thesis; but why are you questioning the assertion that
the womb provides relative comfort and safety compared with the world
outside the womb? is that statement contentious?
scientists are not concerned with what does not exist, so they don't tend to exert
effort to prove that god or anything else doesn't exist. the scientists' role
is to always examine what others claim as proof; and to put it
through the rigors of the scientific method; to learn if an
assertion, conjecture, hypothesis, theory,
or "proof" is scientific, or not.
do you believe in theories espoused by:
pythagorous?
copernicus?
gallileo?
newton?
einstein?
(assumedly "yes", we are people of reason. some of us are artists; many
of us claim to be engineers. some even claim to be expert engineers.)
do you believe in: chaos theory and string theory?
do you believe that there are dimensions in
the universe that we cannot see?
none of that is proven.
the big bang? many big bangs?
this is not proven... i think
it looks like there was at
least one "big bang",
even to a layperson.
what do you see?
i do not understand why anyone feels a need
to assault science. especially on an
engineering forum.
jeff dinces
|
Hi Jeff. The first part of my comment was mainly referring to Harland's example of critical thinking. It is to the point and avoids the unnecessary use of the emotive to get a point across. Anyone can directly reply to such a post by showing, if you believe so that his argument is flawed. For example, you could take the line that the original argument he refered to does not presume evolution.
My second statement points to the Cosmological Argument.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cosmological_argumentHere are two small exerpts from wiki;
The argument
Framed as an informal proof, the first cause argument can be stated as follows:
1. Every finite and contingent being has a cause.
2. Nothing finite and dependent (contingent) can cause itself.
3. A causal chain cannot be of infinite length.
4. Therefore, there must be a first cause; or, there must be something that is not an effect.
The cosmological argument can only speculate about the existence of God from claims about the entire universe, unless the "first cause" is taken to mean the same thing as "God". Thus, the argument is based on the claim that God must exist due to the fact that the universe needs a cause. In other words, the existence of the universe requires an explanation, and an active creation of the universe by a being outside of the universe — generally assumed to be God — is that explanation.
In light of the Big Bang theory, a stylized version of cosmological argument for the existence of God has emerged (sometimes called the Kalam cosmological argument, the following form of which was put forth by William Lane Craig):
1. Whatever begins to exist has a cause.
2. The universe began to exist.
3. Therefore, the universe had a cause.
=====================================================
Scientific positions
The argument for a Prime Mover is based on the scientific foundation of Newtonian physics and its earlier predecessors — the idea that a body at rest will remain at rest unless acted upon by an outside source. However, while Newton's ideas survive in physics since they conveniently and easily describe the movement of objects at the human (that is, not cosmic or atomic) level, they no longer represent the most accurate and truthful representations of the physical universe. Some scientists feel that the development of the laws of thermodynamics in the 19th century and quantum physics in the 20th century have weakened a purely scientific expression of the cosmological argument.[14]
Modern physics has many examples of bodies being moved without any moving body, seriously undermining the first premise of the Prime Mover argument, that every object in motion must be moved by another object in motion. Physicist Michio Kaku directly addresses the cosmological argument in his book Hyperspace, saying it is easily dismissed by the laws of conservation of mass and energy and the laws governing molecular physics. He quotes one of many examples — "gas molecules may bounce against the walls of a container without requiring anything or anyone to get them moving." According to Kaku, these particles could move forever, without beginning or end. So, there is no need for a First Mover to explain the origins of motion.[15] It does not provide an explanation for the reason those molecules exist in the first place however. Some argue a challenge to the cosmological argument is the nature of time. The Big Bang theory states that it is the point in which all dimensions came into being, the start of both space and time. Then, the question "What was there before the universe?" makes no sense; the concept of "before" becomes meaningless when considering a situation without time, and thus the concepts of cause and effects so necessary to the cosmological argument no longer apply. This has been put forward by Stephen Hawking, who said that asking what occurred before the Big Bang is like asking what is north of the North Pole.[16] However many cosmologists and physicists do attempt to investigate what could have occurred before and caused the Big Bang, using such scenarios as the collision of branes to give a cause of the Big Bang, although such hypotheses are highly speculative.
[edit]
================================
Now this is all interesting stuff but i must say in all this i have not directly adressed the first post of this thread.
To me "The Embryonic and Parental Shell Theory" is not the stuff of science, rather an attempt to explain "the basis for religious feeling" seemingly inbuilt in Humans.
As an aside i would use the word spiritual rather than religious. The word religion to me points to the structural or institutional organizations formed as a response to individual spiritual quest, or journey.
Now the rigors of science should be able to test "The Embryonic and Parental Shell Theory",and I have just thought of one likely test, a study of people who are known to have experienced significant fetal distress. Not a problem.... the results would be enlightening.....has such a study been done by Cornelis Mondt to test his theory.... Come to think of it, what scientific tests has he done to test his theory?
Author
Topic: Fascinating explanation of the human need for god (Read 19391 times)