Something that causes doubt

[IWantGod]

How did the first animated cells, which are quite complex physically, come into being and actually begin to live (ensouled one could say)?

You going to have to explain the bolded part, since i do not view the first cells as having a spiritual nature.

 

[tafan2]

Ok, I was using the term abiogenesis to mean your phrase "life wa,s an actualised potential of a natural process ", as I thought it removed the abuguity, perhaps I was wrong. So what does that have to do with materialism. Materialism is the belief that all there is, all that exists is our natural universe, is it not? So, obviously materialists have to belief the first life spontaneously started as part of a purely natural process.

I am not burdened with the restriction of materialism, as such, it does not seem to me that the beginning of life was a purely natural process. Why? Because lack of evidence.

 

[tafan2]

All living beings are animated by a soul. Indeed, the word “animate” has the root of “anima” which in latin is a soul.

 

[IWantGod]

Materialism is the belief that all there is, all that exists is our natural universe, is it not?

But that is not a view i have argued; and again, i ask you, what does that have to do with abiogenesis?

 

[IWantGod]

materialists have to belief the first life spontaneously started

The fact that they have to believe that has no relevance to whether or not it happened that way and has no significance regarding the possibility of it. A Theist can come to the same conclusion for the reasons i have already stated.

 

[IWantGod]

All living beings are animated by a soul. Indeed, the word “animate” has the root of “anima” which in latin is a soul.

They are animated by God’s Telos, but if by the word soul you mean they have a spiritual attribute then this is not a teaching of the church and is misleading. Can you describe what is meant by the “soul” in this context. Does the church teach that the first living cells had non-physical natures.

 

[tafan2]

I never said a theist could not, I just said it did not make sense to me.

They are animated by God’s Telos, but if by the word soul you mean they have a spiritual attribute then this is not a teaching of the church and is misleading. Can you describe what is meant by the “soul” in this context. Does the church teach that the first living cells had non-physical natures.

The soul is the principle of life. It is what animates all life. This explains it better than I could:

Do Animals Have Souls like Human Beings? | Catholic Answers Q&A

 

[IWantGod]

I never said a theist could not, I just said it did not make sense to me.

That’s fine; at the end of the day i am simply stating what makes sense to me, and i am not foolish enough to think that everybody will agree.

God bless.

 

[IWantGod]

The soul is the principle of life. It is what animates all life. This explains it better than I could:

You are conflating what is meant by the soul in reference to things like the first cells and the soul in reference to non-physical natures.

It has no relevance to what i have argued, and for this reason i must end the conversation.

 

[Gorgias]

Whether there is other life - what stops me from thinking in this direction for long is that I’ve read the Church teaches this: if there is other life, it fell in our Fall and was redeemed when Jesus died on the cross 2,000 years ago in Asia.

No, that’s not a Church teaching that I’ve ever seen in print. The teaching of the Church pretty explicitly ties the fall to the first humans, and original sin to their progeny specifically.

If little green men from the planet Zxcvbnm land on the football field at the next Super Bowl, it’s going to raise some theological questions.

Agreed. Primarily: why didn’t they just buy tickets and enter like the rest of us?

I did well to take care of cooking my breakfast this morning. The grits were runny and they didn’t get hot enough in the microwave, despite my best efforts. Don’t know what went wrong.

You used a microwave. To cook grits. There’s your problem, right there.

So, no, I don’t think I’ve “taken care of any theological problem”.

LOL! No, I was just pointing out that the construction you came up with presents more problems than it solves…

But, from a theological standpoint , are those little green men “human”? That’s all I was saying. I can’t answer that question.

It’s a good question. Yet, that’s not the source of the problem…

A better way to cast it might be "does ‘being human’ absolutely require that a rational, ensouled, intelligent physical entity be descended from Adam and Eve?

This is where the problem lies. And no, the question isn’t one of “humanity”, it’s one of sharing in the Fall and in the need for a savior. And so, the answer here is “yes” – we inherit the fallen nature by propagation, so yes, it’s descent from our first two truly human parents (i.e., “Adam and Eve”) that is what is necessary.

HomeschoolDad:

Are there, then, “humans” on other planets — forget about what they look like, what their bodies are made of, what they breathe (assuming they do “breathe”) — and if so, might Christ share their nature?

Christ is a human person. That means “body and soul composite”. Unless you want to make the case that the ‘body’ part of the equation doesn’t matter, or that a variety of other kinds of bodies are equivalent, then the assertion implicit in your question doesn’t hold up: no, life on other planets isn’t identical to human life.

European explorers had the same questions — “are they human?” — “do they have souls?” — “can they be baptized?”.

And the answer came back ‘yes’ because they were identical to us. Different culture, different skin color perhaps… but identical down to DNA to all other humans! Unless you were willing to assert that this is what you’d define about aliens, we really are talking apples and oranges here…

 

[tafan2]

No, I have not conflated anything. I am the one who brought up the concept of the soul animating life at the beginning of the existence of life. And it was just a minor point in parethesis.
That’s fine about ending the conversation though, that’s your prerogative. Good day.

 

[IWantGod]

Good day.

Good day…

 

[Freddy]

Freddy:

If that had actually been the case then that view would have been promoted as evidence for God. That He created us to love Him and why would we need anything else than planet earth. It would literally make no sense to have planets we couldn’t know. To have galaxies that we couldn’t even see. To have areas of existence that are forever beyond our reach.

It still makes no sense. God has created that which serves no purpose whatsoever.

Well, that is just how we see it. Almighty God can do anything He wants to, for any reason He wants to, even if that “reason” is simply that He wanted to do it.

Even if we cannot fathom why God has done something then we could conceivably propose a reason. That God would do something for no reason makes no sense at all. There have been enough arguments over the ages to convince people that we were the centre of creation. God made everything and He made it for us.

Now it is undeniable that there are parts of creation (that could well be infinitely large) that not only can we never reach but which will be forever inaccessible. Unknowable. It serves no purpose as far as we are concerned.

So either God has done something nonsensical, which is itself nonsensical, or what is out there is not for us but for someone else.

There’s a third option of course. Which is the one to which I ascribe.

 

[Freddy]

Freddy:

It would literally make no sense to have planets we couldn’t know. To have galaxies that we couldn’t even see. To have areas of existence that are forever beyond our reach.

Yet if there were only earth in a vast empty universe, the atheists would be telling me: ‘your God’s power is so small’. The vastness of the universe and the abundance of planets, stars, etc. point to the power and infinity of God.

It’s funny that as we approach the problem from different viewpoints, we come to completely opposite views.

In my opinion, if there was just the earth, moon, sun and a few twinkling lights, then that would be an incredibly strong case for God having made just those things for us.

That there is also a rock on a small moon circling a dead planet revolving a small sun in a tiny solar system in a nondescript galaxy that is outside the observable universe tells me that it’s all entirely natural.

You have quite a problem in convincing me that God made that small rock (and moon, planet, sun etc) and is actively maintaining its existence.

 

[HomeschoolDad]

Whether there is other life - what stops me from thinking in this direction for long is that I’ve read the Church teaches this: if there is other life, it fell in our Fall and was redeemed when Jesus died on the cross 2,000 years ago in Asia.

It seems to me that I’ve read something to the effect that the Fall ruined all creation — for instance, the “beauty” we see in nature is actually horribly ugly, compared to how it looked before the Fall, and if we could see “before and after”, this would be obvious to us. This may have been the writings of some mystic. I don’t remember.

Agreed. Primarily: why didn’t they just buy tickets and enter like the rest of us?

Just think of it as part of the halftime show.

You used a microwave . To cook grits . There’s your problem, right there.

They were instant. Sometimes I get the craving, and I keep them on hand.

European explorers had the same questions — “are they human?” — “do they have souls?” — “can they be baptized?”.

DNA wasn’t a “thing” back then, rather, it existed (obviously) but no one knew about it. I think one of the “big mysteries” here was how you could have a whole race of people, but no one had ever been there to tell them about Christ. Or maybe someone had. We don’t know the whole story on pre-Columbian European contact with the New World, nor, for that matter, the various races that could have settled in the Americas throughout human history.

 

[Dan_Defender]

You have quite a problem in convincing me that God made that small rock (and moon, planet, sun etc) and is actively maintaining its existence.

I’m not trying to convince you of anything. I simply express my views here. To me, science has so far discovered a good number of lifeless planetary systems and that cannot be by chance. God is showing us we live in the best of all possible worlds.

 

[Freddy]

Freddy:

You have quite a problem in convincing me that God made that small rock (and moon, planet, sun etc) and is actively maintaining its existence.

God is showing us we live in the best of all possible worlds.

That’s like being amazed at the fact that a puddle is the exact shape of the hole it’s in.

 

[Gorgias]

They were instant. Sometimes I get the craving, and I keep them on hand.

Resist the craving.

DNA wasn’t a “thing” back then, rather, it existed (obviously) but no one knew about it.

Then why is it so painful to you to know that they had to ask the question (since they didn’t have the scientific processes to just ‘know’)?

You have quite a problem in convincing me that God made that small rock (and moon, planet, sun etc) and is actively maintaining its existence.

100 years ago, they didn’t know that rock existed. Today, or 100 years from today, not so much. Where’s that argument, then, about the existence of (currently) unknown knowledge proving against God?

That’s like being amazed at the fact that a puddle is the exact shape of the hole it’s in.

Whereas you’re amazed that we’re not dismayed that the puddle holds mud.

 

[Freddy]

Freddy:

You have quite a problem in convincing me that God made that small rock (and moon, planet, sun etc) and is actively maintaining its existence.

100 years ago, they didn’t know that rock existed. Today, or 100 years from today, not so much. Where’s that argument, then, about the existence of (currently) unknown knowledge proving against God?

Did someone saay it proved against God?

No, I just checked. No-one did. But what someone said (me, actually) was that a small system, which is all we need, makes sense. A system where we not only cannot access an infinity of what has been created but cannot even know what is there seems…well, nonsensical.

So we’ve gradually moved from what appeared to be eminently sensible to that which is nonsensical. At least as far as we are concerned. But maybe it’s meant for someone else.

 

[po18guy]

As a culture, we are not so much culpable for being unthinking, but for gross levels of over-thinking.

Simplicity clarifies, while over-thinking complicates.

God is utter simplicity. Truth simplifies.

The devil loves complication. It leads many souls (two to begin with) away from God.

I see a relationship here, if not actual causation. IMO, much of what passes for “philosophy” in our culture is merely over-thinking.