Comments by "" (@louistournas120) on "TED"
channel.
-
1
-
@GMC-qo9xi :
"‘faith’ is actually a real thing like in the same vein as say ‘love’"
==I know what love is but What is faith?
There is physical evidence for love. By physical, I mean made of atoms.
First off, we need a human brain. The human brain is where human thought, logic, vision processing, sound processing, memory,
emotions happen. When a person is in love with something, he would take actions accordingly. If he/she loves someone, he/she takes
actions accordingly.
Also, in principle there would be evidence in the neuronal connections but right now, we don't understand the human brain that
well.
"God is found through spirit, not a microscope... Love for example would be a much better tool for detecting traces of ‘God’ than
say the Hubble telescope?"
==How would you determine if what you have found are gods as opposed to just "feelings"?
I'm don't thing that feelings are the best way to determine what is real and what is not real.
Reality should be something observable by anybody.
That's why in the science domain, people argue and debate but in the end, when enough evidence piles up, the explanations for them
slowly become accepted. When a model in science has the ability to explain and make predictions that can be tested, we call this a
good model.
"before countering arguing the numerous weaknesses in my words, that science itself tells us that ‘everything’ comes from
‘nothing’—or an infinitesimally small dot."
==Science doesn't state that everything comes from nothing.
Perhaps you are talking about Lawrence Krauss's book. He explains that stuff in his book, I believe on page 5.
The Big Bang theory postulates that since space is expanding, then logically, going back in time, space was more compact and
possibly crushed into a very tiny dot.
"Science without these ‘things’ is completely limited or cut off at the knees when it comes to describing spirit and spiritual
things like God."
==Unfortunately, I do not know what spirit is. It isn't something that is demonstrated in the sciences.
"Humans are spiritual being living in a physical reality, anyone who can’t accept this (that we are truly spiritual) cannot see
anything beyond the physical."
==I'm not sure why some humans have a need for "beyond the physical". Perhaps the physical world is hard to understand. Perhaps it
is hard to work with. Perhaps it does things that you have no control over, such as death and pure chance.
That's something that you would have to explain to me.
"And whose to say that spirit and science are in any kind of opposition? Science just hasn’t discovered a way to effectively
‘observe’ or even define what spirit is (thank God). Science just needs a few more tools in the box (like faith.)"
==Faith is a tool? Explain how a scientist would use it?
"The ultimate irony, being that children would have a better chance of proving/observing God than any of the tools of science do.
(Ie. Innocence/purity, simplicity, unfettered by the ‘ways’ of man—corruption, etc...) Be therefore ‘like’ children should you
wish to see the kingdom of God."
==I don't know if what you said is true or not. Can it be demonstrated in some way?
1
-
1
-
@GMC-qo9xi :
"did you read Luke 10:21?"
==This is Luke 10:21 NIV version
At that time Jesus, full of joy through the Holy Spirit, said, "I praise you, Father, Lord of heaven and earth, because you have
hidden these things from the wise and learned, and revealed them to little children. Yes, Father, for this is what you were
pleased to do.
What are you trying to tell me with Luke 10:21?
"however, for spiritual things we shall turn to spirit"
==What is a spirit?
I base what I believe in on as much evidence as possible.
Reading a book is fine but the ideas they present have to be verifiable, reliable, testable.
For example, I cannot verify if Jesus is full of joy.
In fact, it is pretty irrelevant.
I cannot verify if Jesus said "I praise you, Father, Lord of heaven and earth .........".
Let's say I give it the benefit of the doubt and Jesus spoke those words.
The question is:
1. Is Jesus really talking to a god?
2. I know that there is an Earth. By heaven, is he talking about space or some other dimension?
3. Does the "god" really hide these things from the wise and learned? Is he talking about Isaac Newton?
The bible is basically a piece of paper and ink. Anybody can buy paper and ink and write whatever they wish.
Anybody can get webspace and write whatever they want on their website.
You shouldn't just believe anything without verification.
Most importantly, you should ask questions.
"Seek understanding, use your intelligence to navigate the lies from the truth."
==Sure, I don't have a problem with that.
The difference between you and me is that you think the Bible is entirely factual and I do not.
How come we have come to different conclusions?
I think you already answered it:
You trust the people who wrote the Bible.
So, why do you trust them when other people who were there did not trust him?
1
-
@GMC-qo9xi :
"the system of verification you use to filter out baloney is admirable and obviously makes sense. However, at the same time of filtering out some useless noise, it is still not a reliable method to always ensure truth. For example, does it have the ability to cut through its own bias? Is it not self protecting and automatically rejecting anything that doesn’t fit within its preconditions?"
==Yes, it is pretty important in science to have a strong filter. The job of the filter is to block bad information, unverifiable claims.
Without a filter, everything gets in and pollutes the books of science.
Since science is done by humans, individual humans have their own biases. That may be political, it may be religion, it might be that the human has developed an idea that he likes or thinks is true.
In order to deal with that, it is necessary that any other peer be able to verify the work.
But even that does not guarantee that the filters of science will work.
There is no 100% guarantee.
So, the solution that you are proposing is to eliminate the filter?
Should we go with faith in science?
How would that make science superior to science without faith in gods?
1
-
@GMC-qo9xi :
"LoL, I’m actually saying you cannot find the answers that deal with spirit through the scientific method. And that cracking the mystery of God is truly what man’s purpose is. So the person that puts all their eggs in that basket (the science alone one) is essentially missing the point. Though I say it’s admirable to have a rigid filter like you describe, that filter is not necessarily going to serve you well when seeking the answers to origins of man and the universe... "
==I can't agree that that is human's purpose.
I think that science is the best way to determining how reality functions. The inductive method is what is currently used in science (Collect data, build a model, explain the situation, make predictions. This becomes the initial hypothesis.).
The previous way was to use the deductive method which basically means sitting in a chair and thinking about how reality operates. Although that is nice, in the end, data must be gathered from reality.
I'm not sure how you are going to determine how many gods there are, what they do, where they are located, and various other details.
Perhaps you can explain your methodology.
"You can clone life and bring back the wooly mammoth from extinction with science, you cannot however discover the true purpose or source of life through it."
==I would use the word purpose in certain situations such as
1. The watch. Humans invented the mechanical/digital watch in order to keep track of time.
2. A painting. An artist draws a painting. The reason is that he likes to pain certain scenery. An art admirer buys it. The purpose of the painting is entertainment.
I don't see the mountains as having a purpose. Same goes to all natural phenomenon. I think nature is a mindless thing. It has no purpose.
I can understand your POV. You think that everything is artificial and so, they have purpose (Some sort of utility).
"If ‘the filter’ automatically just filters all of this out [ie. b/c its preconditions are not met] then you can be sure that the filter is not serving you, but is serving something/someone else"
==I think what you mean to say is that the filter is blocking something that is true.
It certainly is possible that some things are true and there is no verifiable data yet.
That is why the books of science remain opens.
I think the best time to believe that some "thing" exists or something is true is when it can be verified and not before.
^^^^^^^^I am talking about the default position here. The default position is non belief as to the existence of gods.
The same kind of concept is present in science.
The same kind of concept is present in criminology: not guilty until proven guilty.
The prosecution and his team have to put in the work to bring evidence that Mr X did the crime rather than Mr X proving that he is innocent.
"Consider the previous example in light of quantum theory. It contains a theory called the ‘observer effect’, which scientists have shown that observation, even passive observation changes the outcome of a phenomenon."
==It's not an observer effect. Some people have misunderstood the interference experiment. It has nothing to do with consciousness. Interacting with an electron (which has wave behavior) changes its behavior.
There is no indication that reality is subjective or that we are creating reality.
"Again consider, love and hate. When hate (dark) is used as the perspective for observing a situation or phenomenon you might conclude that something is bad, regardless of whether or not it is inherently bad and vice a versa with love (light) as the perspective. This is like faith. When faith is part of the equation you can actually change the outcome. Like optimism, it can improve the outcome of a phenomenon... BUT everything has its opposite to counter it, for where faith doesn’t exist you will have doubt, where love doesn’t exist you will have hate, etc... everything of this nature appears to be in a sort of vacuum. If you are not full of one thing you will be full of its other.... but in reality it’s usually a combination of both elements that are in constant flux"
==I don't understand. Perhaps you can give an example.
So what is your plan for heaven. What will you be doing?
1
-
@GMC-qo9xi :
"Seek and you will find, ask and you will receive, knock and the door will be opened... to me this is directly encouraging us (from the gospel) to ‘learn’, to seek knowledge and understanding as our primary goal/instinct."
==To you, those lines have value.
To me, they don't have any value at all since they are far too general and not giving usuable information.
Do you really need some other human to tell you to learn, to seek knowledge?
It is in human nature to be curious. It is also present in other animals.
I don't know. It is a huge planet with 6 billion people. Perhaps in your case you aren't curious about the world around you.
I can understand that there are some humans who have problems that get in their way: they need clothes, food, medicine.
What is your excuse? You have a PC. You have a library nearby. You have access to a higher education.
"I was an atheist and very cynical about anything supernatural, it was only after been shown that science didn’t really have any of the pertinent answers (origins, purpose, etc...) that I assumed it had."
==I was a christian and I realized that primitive man did not have all the answers and they developed the answers as they saw fit to them. Death is difficult to accept for any sentient being and so, they began believing in having souls at some point. Different cultures developed their own creation myths, their own gods.
The core of all religions is THE SOUL. All the rest is just icing on the cake.
People just don't want to die. They don't want to suffer. They don't want their loved ones to suffer. So, they dream of a utopia.
(Note: I don't know the details of every religion but the ones that I know about have the concept of the "soul".)
I also learned that people who use the term supernatural have no idea what it is. It is just a word that gets thrown around. The most I have gotten is "above nature". Fine, but is there anything observable?
"science didn’t really have any of the pertinent answers (origins, purpose, etc...)"
==Science is a natural philosophy. In other words you have to keep your political and religious biases out of it. So, it is normal that you aren't going to find a purpose to why you exist with science. There is no evidence that the universe is artificial or that we are artificial. As for origin of the hominid species, evolution theory covers that. The ultimate beginings of life would be covered by chemistry/abiogenesis which is a work in progress with various hypothesis that are being worked on. It isn't solve yet.
"The more I looked the bigger that gaps and the recognition that it is actual through faith that those gaps are being filled, with the idea that they will ‘soon’ be discovered"
==Maybe they will be discovered and maybe they won't.
If that is not acceptable to you, then might as well forget about science and go with religion which says it has the answers.
"scientific method is a good tool for reducing bias and raising objectivity above all things.... but yet it’s apparent faux pas is that it kind of ‘lies’ at the same time"
==What lie are you talking about?
"by it’s very nature/purpose it basically removes God from the equation or from having any pertinence to anything."
==Why would we write in the books of science about the jewish god that you believe in? Why not the god that the greeks believed in? Or one of the thousands of other gods?
Well, which gods do you want included in the page of a science book and what do you want them to write?
"And the aftermath focuses on stuff like evolution and then somehow or other use that as a bases for arguing against creation"
==Science doesn't argue against the existence of any gods or aliens and science doesn't use evolution theory to argue against them. However, Evolution theory, geology, radiometric dating and so on certainly tell us that young earth creationism is none sense.
This is why the christian/jew/muslims who are into young earth creationism see science as their enemy. Quite a few of them have mentioned that Evolution theory comes from the devil.
"If you can follow this, you should be able to admit that the ‘god’ of the gaps is not created by ‘creationists’"
==It absolutely comes from creationists and also ancient humans.
God of the gaps means when you have a gap in your knowledge, for example, how does lightning work/happen and if you don't know the answer, you insert god into it.
How did life form on Earth? God did it!
How did the Sun form? God did it!
How did that cloud form? God did it!
^^^^^^^^As you can see, the "god did it" can be used at any point in time. It is an easy answer. It doesn't require much thought. It doesn't required expensive equipment, a good education. Basically, any idiot can say "god did it!".
"both, essentially coming from nothing, except we can play the laws of thermal dynamics and maybe use something like E=mc^2... and then say well from pure energy everything came to be... but then again that essentially proves God.... and your question of what is spirit? Everything is energy, is moving, is not even ‘solid’... you would know this better than most. How does that sit with you in light of nature supposedly not being supernatural?"
==You lost me. How does that prove that a god exists? You seem to be talking about the initial stages of the Big Bang.
Sure, what is a spirit? Where is your spirit located?
"How is rock, the most natural thing we can think of actually ‘natural’? It is hollow? It’s mass is only like 1/100,000 of something that we would naturally assume is solid... you could blast a rock with quarks or neutrinos and they would never even meet each other."
==What???
"Bottom line is that I know where we come from"
==Well, how do you know that the Bible comes from a god?
1
-
@GMC-qo9xi :
"Your first paragraph missed the mark so badly"
==What I am suggesting is that there are some ideas that are a little bit advanced and there are some ideas that are so basic that
even the people from cavemen times could figure it out.
I will give you a few examples. Tell me if it makes sense or not.
Example 1:
What are the chances that a primitive man (from ~5000 y ago) will try to build a house? I would say pretty high. Reason: All humans want
to have a safe location to dwell, out of the winds and rain. [Do you agree or disagree?]
Example 2:
What are the chances that such a man will invent the door? I would say pretty high. Reason: Humans want to feel safe in their home. They would also invent the hinge and eventually, someone will invent a way to block the door. [Do you agree or disagree?]
Example 3:
What are the chances that a primitive man will talk about atoms, the existence of sub atomic particles, the arrangement of electrons in shells, the arrangement of nucleons in shells, nuclear stability? I would say the chances are 0. [Do you agree or disagree?]
Example 4:
What are the chances that humans would invent a language? What are the chance that they would invent a written language? I would say pretty high. Reason: humans want to record what they are doing bc they know that they will die and history will be forgotten. [Do you agree or disagree?]
Example 5:
The Bible. What are the chances that some believer would write that when you seek god, he will reply back (or something of the sort). I am referring to what you wrote ""Seek and you will find, ask and you will receive, knock and the door will be opened.". To me, it seems normal that they would write stuff like that. I am not seeing anything extraordinary. Primitive man is perfectly capable of writing such things.
If they had written about Example 3, I would sat WOW. HOLY COW! That's a lot of details they discovered. How did they find out about the atomic structure and nuclear structure?
So, go ahead and give your input.
Does the Bible contain things that ancient man could not have written on his own? Did it really require a super intelligent being to write it?
1
-
@GMC-qo9xi :
"I suppose you would have me go backwards to rejoin you with the way I used to perceive reality, a return to an empty,
materialistic philosophy"
==No, that's not what I am talking about.
I am talking about how would you (or anyone else) be able to tell what is true and what is false.
You can't just listen to a story and based on your feelings decide whether a story is true just because it makes you feel good.
The best way to determine what is true is to collect evidence. Multiple people should be able to view the evidence. In fact,
anybody should be able to view it.
"where we sacrifice our children to false gods. Do you understand this? We (as a species) need to wake up and turn away from
idolatry (worshiping stuff) and move forward into spiritual lives, but in truth"
==Who is asking you to sacrifice our children to false gods?
No sorry, I don't understand it. Are you talking about a real event that happened with you? Are you talking about a dream? Are you
talking about a movie?
"no more lies, no more power structure that cater to the rich or to corporations or to the powerful (including the clergy)"
==There are always power structures. For example, you are quoting the Bible so I assume you are a christian. That book talks about
king, a kingdom, a throne. It describe the "god" as omnipotent and omniscient being. They sold you a story about how loveable the jewish god is. It's just a story. It is ink on paper. There is no evidence for any of it.
"So where is the truth? How do we establish who is right? Votes? Lol. For ‘now’ we decide what is true, even if we don’t actually have a clue."
==You seem to be talking about politics & human law. Human laws can be changed and policies can be changed.
I am talking about reality itself. Reality, the laws of reality can't be changed.
If you want to believe the bible comes from the god, first, there needs to be solid evidence that it comes from a god.
1
-
1
-
1
-
1
-
1
-
1
-
1
-
@damminers49 :
"ok how can those things be easily made?"
==Abiogenesis is not a solved problem, however, there are ideas. For example, look up RNA world hypothesis and the experiments that relate to it.
It is better to try to figure out a solution and experiment rather than give up and claim "the gods did it", which is the lazy man's answer to everything.
That's like going to the hardware store and asking the helper, "How do I paint my room" and he answers "You paint a room by painting the room".
"Second, can our brightest make a functioning cell, if it’s a simple process?"
==Intelligence is irrelevant.
I am not talking about intelligent design where the designer sits down and tries to figure out which sequence of nucleobases makes a human. That is something that is proposed by theists.
The RNA world hypothesis proposes that a short RNA sequence forms and is able to self-catalyze and make duplicates of itself.
The best replicator wins.
"You are simply speaking about what is seen in nature, it exists ie amino acids and what isn’t seen as a natural complexity such as an engine."
==You are stuck in thinking that if something is complex, then it is not natural. You don't even know what complex means. It is just a word you and ID people throw around. Even I throw it around as you can see. It doesn't have any particualr meaning.
I gave you an example of how complexity is meaningless.
There are certain things that nature cannot do, even if it is simple: iron nails, copper pipe, brock, sheet of glass.
Is number 1 less complex than 111111111?
What is DNA? It is a sequence of nucleaobases than can be converted to letter AGCTAGCTGAGAGA.........
which can be converted to numbers.
If you can have 1, why can't you have 11 or 111, etc?
"How does he misunderstand evolutionary theory"
==I gave you the link to the video. He is confusing abiogenesis with Evolution theory.
Did you watch his video?
1
-
+Mysteryskatin:
"Atheists cannot disprove God."
==There are a lot of things that me and you can't prove to not exist, such as smurfs, leprechauns and other magical things.
I can't even prove that I don't have a sister.
In order to prove the existence of something physical, you need evidence.
If you claim that all gods are non physical, then they don't exist.
If you think about it, numbers, names, words, ideas, software (Windows XP) don't exist either.
They can only "exist" if there is a physical (atoms/molecules/energy) representation of them.
Yes, I have a CD with Windows XP on it. Do you think that this plastic is really Windows XP?
1
-
1
-
+Mesafint Fanuel:
"First of all you atheists should remove the notion "thousands of other religions from your minds" because the reality on the ground is that there are only three type of worship places in you neighborhoods christian church, Islamic mosque(few in number), and Hindu temple(highly unlikely)."
==What is or is not in my current neighborhood or in my current century is irrelevant.
The fact is that there are hundreds of cultures and probably thousands of religions have popped up and disappeared.
The fact that most of them have died out doesn't change the reality that religions and gods can be invented by mere humans.
"Most of you don't take Hindus or budhist seriously they are not in your sphere of existence so we are left with three to investigate"
==FACT1: I don't know those 2 religions in detail.
FACT2: Those 2 religions are not a problem for prime countries like USA, Canada, Europe, Russia, Australia.
Do you think if I read their books cover to cover, it would change my mind?
FACT : Nope. Ink on paper doesn't convince me specially when it is just a religion.
"You are supposed to go "read" what it says and then say that the bible is a forgery"
==Ok, I have read it. And? What is the point you are trying to make?
You should read the bible plus read some books written by atheists such as Richard Carrier. These are the guys who notice the problems with the bible, the koran,
"You are mistaken the bible itself says that its contents are written by "Holy men" inspired by the spirit of God."
==How difficult is it to write that?
"If you think this people are not "Holy" men then it up to you to prove to me that they are not holy men but forgerers"
==FACT1: There are mistakes in the bible. (Bats aren't birds. Rabbits don't chew the cud. Insects don't have 4 legs)
FACT2: The genesis story and flood story is invalidated by modern science.
FACT3: conflicting info in the bible.
FACT4: Why would holy men write the bible and not "the god"? OK, not really a fact but a pretty good question.
Ok, so go ahead and prove to me that the bible is written by holy men.
"Every bible reading christian will tell you this. So you are claiming that this is not paul's letters but forgeries in the name of Paul?"
==No. I said no such thing. You really should re-read what I wrote.
"I am sure you will say it is upto me to prove Gods existence to which I say ok the proof is the BIBLE."
==It would not be fair for me to ask you that since I know that you can't provide any evidence.
"For instance the evidence of potassium-argon dating of a rock presently says one scientist that an asteroid hit the earth and wiped out the dinosaurs"
==I have not heard of such a thing. Show me the white paper.
K-Ar dating is used to date rocks. It gives no indication about an asteroid hit.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/K%E2%80%93Ar_dating
Also, it is believed that the majority of the Ar40 in our atmosphere is a result of K40 decay. This would explain why 99.6% of the Ar is Ar40 on Earth while on Mars, there is far more Ar36 which is the nuclide that is most likely to form during nucleosynthesis.
Evidence 1:
The reason why they think a major asteroid strike occurred is because of the presence of a layer of age 65 My that is an unusually high with iridium. This layer appears all across the planet.
Evidence 2:
Chicxulub has a major crater.
Source: https://www.livescience.com/60898-asteroid-struck-unlucky-spot-doomed-dinosaurs.html
1
-
1
-
@damminers49 :
"It’s one thing to find assembled amino acids, etc. Its another to assemble them at random."
==#1. There aren't just amino acids that can be made, but also nucleobases and sugars and more complex molecules but that is besides the point.
#2
My POINT IS
I'll give you a very short explanation as to what I was talking about.
When an ID "scientist" compares an engine to a cell, his comparison is deeply flawed.
Like I already explained, the chances of components for your engine to come together properly is 0.
Not only that, but you won't even find the components in nature. The chances are 0.
You won't even find the molds and tools in nature. The chances are 0.
How do you expect an engine to get assembled?
For a cell, the components (amino acids, sugars, nucleobases and various substances) can be made easily. We can say the chances are 100%.
We are already a good step ahead compared to your engine.
The missing piece in our knowledge is how did the first cell form, what was it like, what were the next steps in their evolution?
So don't compare bulk objects to molecular machines.
You were comparing a book with a molecular machine (the cell).
1
-
1
-
1
-
@damminers49 :
I think the chances of nature producing certain things, even simple things such as a sheet of zinc is 0. If you take a torch and melt some zinc, the forces of attraction between the atoms of zinc would try to shape the zinc into a ball, while gravity pushes the zinc ball onto the ground.
As for the book, the probability of finding processed wood and shaped into paper form is pretty much 0, just like the zinc sheet example.
There is also little chance that the forces of nature would pick up a pen and have it move around the paper to form words/sentences.
In order to make a sheet of zinc, industry uses rollers to press down on a block of zinc and they pass the zinc multiple times between rollers.
The same kind of technique is need to make paper. Paper also requires chemical processes to break down the lignin in the wood.
As for the zinc, there is no zinc in metallic form on Earth. It is a very reactive metal. You can find compounds like ZnO, ZnSO4, ZnCO3 and more complex compounds that contain zinc atoms.
Therefore, molds and tools are needed to make a sheet of zinc or a sheet of paper. Chemical reactions are also needed to make the starting material. On top of that, the tools and molds aren't made by nature either.
So, if I ever find a book in nature, I would conclude a intelligent being created it.
There are certain shapes that nature doesn't tend to produce, like iron nails, hammers, sheet of glass, bricks, copper pipes. All those things require molds and tools to shape the material.
Nails, hammers, sheets of glass are all very simple shapes. Much more simpler than a book.
We don't find any of them in nature.
1
-
1
-
1
-
1
-
1
-
1
-
1
-
1
-
1
-
@biffalobull2335 I try to understand different people’s point of view.
Some people have a christian background and from their point of view, a person is either male or female and they claim that this is determined only by the 23 chromosome pair.
This was something that was though in biology class as well.
I’m not talking about all christians, since there are various sects of christianity, and perhaps in each sect, the opinions are not uniform either.
Some christians that think you are born as a male or female, based on genitals and that the genitals reflect what role a person should play.
They also tend to have a problem with homosexuality since there are lines about it in their Bible.
For most people, it is not a problem since they are heterosexual and they are male and have male organs or
they have female organs and they are heterosexual and are comfortable in their bodies.
It is only a problem for minority groups since they might be born into one of those christian families or village or city. It turns their lives upside down.
Then, there is the authority, such as the federal government. For example, in Canada and in the USA, the government decided that homosexuals deserve the same rights as everyone else and should be allowed to marry.
But what about democracy? Shouldn’t it be put to a vote? Shouldn’t the christian groups win and choose how people live their life?
“In fact you’ve not only boarded the train to La La Land, you’ve already arrived and purchased a house there”
==I understand your POV.
I understand that you are upset. Lots of people are upset.
So what should I do? Should I claim that only heterosexual males and heterosexual females exist and join your group?
1
-
@biffalobull2335 “Your definition of racism is from the 60s and your analysis is not based in reality”
==Word definitions are quite flexible. I find that it varies from person to person. For example, when someone uses the word spiritual, I ask them what it means to them.
Some of them explain while some of them respond with “You know what it means and you are pretending not to know” and then I have to respond with “the definition varies and that is why I ask him and yet, they don’t provide their definition.
For the question of racism:
I have had that experience recently when someone said there is no such thing as race and he linked me to a video. I watched it entirely. It is from a geneticist.
I pointed him to the later parts of the video where the geneticist gives an important conclusion. Although there isn’t a clear cut set of genes that tell us that such and such is asian, such and such is from african descent, such and such is a native of north america, there is a certain set of genes that appear with a higher frequency in certain populations.
Essentially, what that means is that race is a real notion. We can all see it with our eyes when we look at the shape of a human skull and genetics backs it up.
There is a certain episode of the Eye of Nye, starring Bill Nye the science guy. A certain geneticist shows that genetics does not support the notion of race but I think she had only measured the presence of 4 genes.
I don’t think that is enough. For eye color, only one gene controls eye color. For the notion of race, I don’t know but there must be plenty that control skull shape and other features.
I have heard someone claim that math is a european thing.
Racism is real but in order to fight it, it is making some people insane. By insane, I mean that their belief is not matching up with reality/observation.
Truth is subjective? Maybe.
It is clear that word definitions are subjective. If you want to base the definition of race on the presence of 4 genes and you conclude that race doesn’t exist, then that is true.
If you want to define race via the presence of 50 genes, maybe then you will conclude that race does exist.
If you want to define a corvette as a certain structure and if I remove a certain screw, then maybe it is no longer a corvette.
What is a woman? Is it defined by the 23 chromosome pair? Is it define by the brain? Is it defined by the genital organs?
When a baby is born, hospitals use the genitals to declare a baby as male or female.
But the baby grows up and maybe he feels like a woman.
Then it turns into a legal battle since society’s definition of male and female is based on genitals at the hospital.
Merry Christmas to you!
1
-
1
-
1
-
@mangs9940 Yes, I was generalizing. That’s what statistics are for. Statistics tell us about trends. They give us clues as to what is going on.
Of course there are plenty of scientists that are religious.
There was an article on the Huffington Post that shows that countries with the best standards of living are the most atheist. This makes sense since when life is hard, people with very little solutions are desperate and they lean on religion as a crutch. For sure, the old days, thousands of years ago, life was much harder.
The converse is also true. The easier life gets, the more engineering solutions, the more technological solutions, the more medical solutions there are, the less humans need the god-aliens to help them out.
The less science savvy a person is, the more gaps he has in his knowledge and the more likely it is that he will be a young earth creationist.
However, there was one university professor, a chemist, that they showed that was a young earth creationist.
There was a 2009 statisitc from Pew that shows:
95% of the general public state that they believe in a god.
5% of the general public DO NOT.
51% of scientists state that they believe in a god.
48% of scientists DO NOT. We count don’t know since they are not stating that they believe in a god.
(Survey of scientists who are members of the American Association for the Advancement of Science)
There was some statistic on Nasonline, also on wikipeda and also on Nature:
Among the members of the National Academy of Sciences in the United States, 7% believed in the existence of God, 72.2% did not, and 20.8% were agnostic or had doubts.
I just put people who say they are agnostic in the non-believer group. So, you have 7% believers vs 93% non-believers.
Definitely, in the scientific community, there are far less believers than the general population.
1
-
1
-
1
-
1
-
1
-
1
-
1
-
1
-
1
-
1
-
1
-
1
-
1
-
1