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Charlemagne_III
Guest
Exactly. There is no conception of “before time and space” because there is no evidence that there was a “before.”
Absence of evidence, evidence of absence.
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Absence of evidence, evidence of absence.
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Charlemagne_III
Guest
Newton and Einstein disagree with you. So I hardly think it’s nonsense.
“This most beautiful system [the solar system] could only proceed from the dominion of an intelligent and powerful Being.” Isaac Newton
“I’m not an atheist and I don’t think I can call myself a pantheist. We are in the position of a little child entering a huge library filled with books in many languages. The child knows someone must have written those books. It does not know how. It does not understand the languages in which they are written. The child dimly suspects a mysterious order in the arrangements of the books, but doesn’t know what it is. That, it seems to me, is the attitude of even the most intelligent human being toward God.” Albert Einstein
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Solmyr
Guest
Don’t you have a thought of your own? Only mindlessly parroting what other people said? Newton and Einstein were definitely geniuses in their OWN field, but even there they were not infallible. Einstein could never accept the idea of quantum theory, and Newton was deeply religious, so his worldview reflected that fact.
By the way, IF there is a free will, then our free decisions are NOT caused. This simple fact invalidates the concept about “external causation”.
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987mk
Guest
Einstein quotes?
‘The word god is for me nothing more than the expression and product of human weaknesses, the Bible a collection of honourable, but still primitive legends which are nevertheless pretty childish. No interpretation no matter how subtle can (for me) change this.’
‘I believe in Spinoza’s God who reveals himself in the orderly harmony of what exists, not in a God who concerns himself with the fates and actions of human beings.’
'I have repeatedly said that in my opinion the idea of a personal God is a childlike one. ’
'It seems to me that the idea of a personal God is an anthropological concept which I cannot take seriously. ’
’I do not believe in a personal God and I have never denied this but have expressed it clearly.'
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Charlemagne_III
Guest
Yes, I do!
But for the record, I appreciate the thoughts of deep thinkers.
According to Newton and Einstein, deep thinkers, you would not qualify as a deep thinker.
Your argument about parroting is not a very good one.
Think about that!
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Charlemagne_III
Guest
Yes, everyone knows these quotes, or should know them by now. Einstein did not believe in a personal God. I don’t know how you reconcile that with his belief in God and his denial of atheism. He seems to think there is a God of some sort.
“… everyone who is seriously involved in the pursuit of science becomes convinced that a spirit is manifest in the laws of the Universe—a Spirit vastly superior to that of man.” Albert Einstein
strangenotions.com/einstein-god/
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aclausen
Guest
It’s hard to say that a Deist believes in “God”, as their conception is so very different from the Judeao-Christian God. Einstein’s beliefs are even closer to the edge of Deism than many of the Enlightenment Deists. However you look at it, I don’t think theists can make any claim that he was one of them.
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aclausen
Guest
Which doesn’t really help the “God did it” claim. Perhaps the Universe is solitary and self-contained, finite and yet unbounded.Exactly. There is no conception of “before time and space” because there is no evidence that there was a “before.”
Absence of evidence, evidence of absence.
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Charlemagne_III
Guest
Well, he repudiated atheism.
Pure and simple: Einstein believed in some kind of God. And he saw the way the universe is constructed as evidence of that God. If anyone wants to claim Einstein was full of nonsense, the question can be turned right back on Einstein’s critic. Why is the critic more full of sense than Einstein.
Why should I disagree with Einstein and agree with his critic? What evidence does the critic offer that Einstein was full of nonsense on that score?
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Bradski
Guest
I’ve never really worked out the reasons for these quotes. I mean, I do quote some people myself now and then, but only in reference to a point I might have made. Some people have a better way of putting things, so an ocassional tip of the hat to Plato or Shakespeare or Feynman might be in order.
But constant cut and pastes from a Jewish mathematician, as if to say - He thought there was something out there so it proves me right!
I dunno…
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Charlemagne_III
Guest
In post # 406 this is what Solmyr said:
“No, I don’t know that the universe was “created”. The universe simply exists. It did not “come” from “nothing”. The principle of “whatever has a beginning, must have an external cause for its existence” is nonsense.”
You complain of cut and paste, but this language by Solmyr almost amounts to cut and paste. Several times he and others have used the word “nonsense” to dismiss the idea of a Creator God. I’m getting weary of his dismissive attitude, so I return the favor by cutting and pasting the same quotes from Einstein and Newton over and over. It seems to be the only way you can answer the dismissal of a Creator God as nonsense, because he never has an answer as to why his way of thinking is superior to that of Newton or Einstein or anyone else who happens to believe that the idea of God is not nonsense at all.
And as far as your objection is concerned, if you don’t like Einstein’s and Newton’s quotes, just don’t bother to read them. You’re not the only person in the forum who might be seeing them for the first time and finding them at least slightly interesting.
O.K.?
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Charlemagne_III
Guest
I don’t believe Jews or Christians ever claimed that he was one of them.
But he did believe in a God, and he rejected atheism in the strongest terms possible.
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Bradski
Guest
As does my wife’s hair dresser. Just goes to show, I suppose.
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Charlemagne_III
Guest
Snarky as ever.
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tonyrey
Guest
Inner solitude is not always desirable but it is better than never having any privacy. We would be virtual slaves of others’ opinions but even that is not so devastating as being an atheist who believes we are doomed to be prisoners in our own little mental world - with no hope of ever being known as we really are, strangers to one another from the moment we are born until the moment we disappear forever without a trace… The “inward eye which is the bliss of solitude” can become hell when it dawns on us that no one understands us or knows how we feel. Empathy can give way to apathy - or even psychopathy and sociopathy…
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Charlemagne_III
Guest
… and even suicide.
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tonyrey
Guest
There is certainly a higher rate of suicide in younger men who tend to be less religious than women
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Jelrak_TB
Guest
Precisely this…I concur from acute familiarity with the subject…
Yet even so, it does not then prove a claim to God’s existence: it merely concedes that such would be a more positive hope than any reality involving a more limited end…but how often does reality conform to our ideals?
For all we might be concerned the entirety of this universe might be little more than a simulation on a super-computer belonging to a society a billion years more advanced for whom technology might allow for such incredibly immersive experiences…the big bang being little more than a slight power flux as the simulation came online…
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Charlemagne_III
Guest
The claim to God’s existence is not the issue, since the claim to God’s non-existence also cannot be proven. If you would stipulate that convincing demonstrable proof does not exist in either case, you are left with making a choice: a philosophy of hope in the ultimate Something or a philosophy of resignation to the ultimate Nothing.
Then the question to be asked is this: why does anyone prefer Nothing to Something?
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tonyrey
Guest
It is better to be positive rather than negative. In fact evil is the negative aspect of life… Truth, goodness, freedom, justice, beauty and love are all aspects of reality whereas a void is devoid of everything!
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