Rational belief

[theVOID]

Nice video *subscribed*

I agree with everything in there so far, though it really does not stop the argument from primitive interpretation, that being the people who wrote the book were importing their hypothesis into the holy book and attributing it to God.

A Christian can easily claim that this is just primitive interpretation of theistic creation, just as they claim similar phenomenon for the barbaric laws, the incest etc, how would you respond to that?

Thank you.

If I didn't mention it in the video, the order of events is far too incorrect to even be interpreted in a poetic light. Were a deity to relate the big bang to primitive humans, I'd expect it to be something along the lines of "let there be light" followed by the creation of the stars, then the earth, then the plants, etc. Instead, we find what you would expect from primitive humans creating a geo-centric myth, that is first the earth, then the plants, then the sun, then the stars as an afterthought, etc.

This sounds like my favorite argument against holy texts "God, if he exists, has either never said anything at all or is a frankly a fucking terrible communicator"

And your 'believing heart' is what?

That the natural universe is a machine, that the human mind is not just the result of good fortune and we have a noble destiny as a species.

No, i mean what is it you are referring to as your 'believing heart' - you'r heart doesn't think, so what are you actually attributing this phenomenon to? Is it an emotional need for purpose?

It seems like this is a view contingent on your initial acceptance of deism, which seems to me to be an emotional reason, unless i am mistaken?

Actually, I learned about evolution in high school. I discovered I was a deist around the age of 35.

So why do you think now that a deity must have been involved?

Where did the deity tweak? Assuming that such deistic action is necessary you must have an example of a biological process you believe is not accounted for with natural selection?

Setting things up for our more evolved brains and civilization.

Such as...

And it's not so much "necessary" as it is the alternative is to believe we won the cosmic lottery.

So we didn't happen to be the species that evolved higher intelligence and managed to survive to become an expert at survival, rather we were just given it and the numerous other intelligent primate species such as the neanderthals simply didn't have this cosmic daddy looking out for them?

There is significant evidence that Homo Neanderthal was actually more intelligent than us earlier on, they have evidence of neanderthal tools, rituals and music long before that of any human.

So the deity didn't like them as much as us? Shame, our cousins are extinct now regardless.

Sure, it's possible that it all just happened to work out that way on its own but... wow. I know you're going to say "personal incredulity" again, so I hope I just saved you the bandwidth by beating you to it, but I honestly find it incredulous.

You're being anthropocentric - I for one see no reason to assume that humanity is cosmically special, we're only special to ourselves.

One species was inevitably going to be the one looking back and asking these questions, The fact that it's homo sapiens on this planet is arbitrary.

And how does this sit with animals that have better respiratory systems?

Better for what purpose? In our case, better for communication that, combined with our opposable thumbs and increased cranial capacity, made our current civilization possible. Other animals may have superior respiratory systems for breathing underwater but that's not necessary for our purposes.

Right, but opposable thumbs aren't uniquely human - The only real fundamental advantage we have over our primate cousins is the higher level of intelligence.

I wouldn't say "only" as this is a decisive attribute. Further, our morality is improving over time, contrary to the claims of theists, so I wouldn't conclude any inevitability that ethics will always grow out of intelligence and normal socialization.

Sure, and this is likely not an independent thing, it is the result of being socially inclined and having the ability to pass on the results of examination of this sociality.

Well, call it "kidding on the square" as Al Frankin might say. Yes, it is something I've wondered about and yet it also has the advantage of making the fundies faces turn all kinds of pretty colors. Two birds, one stone.

That would be nice if it was a sound argument... At least it's creative

I would not say it adds nothing. Gay couples can't have children of their own. Het couples will want their own kids if they can have them.

So gay people evolved to take care of the kids of straight couples?

Sure, there are plenty of instances in evolution where an initially unwanted mutation ended up having a slight if not significant benefit - The development of the wings in tree-dwelling mammals was one such thing, believed initially to be disadvantageous because the increasing span of the arm would have made navigation around the environment more difficult, yet it survived and continued to develop, going from useless to more useless, lucky to get by in a harsh environment until it was sufficient to produce a side-effect - The increased span of the arm equated to a larger surface area, decreasing the damage suffered in falls. This is quite a useful advantage for tree-dwelling mammals such as the ancestors to bats, despite the fact that the mutation was likely to have gotten by on the merits of the other developments in the species.

Homosexualities advantages for society likely arose in the same manner, being something that was initially detrimental to society as it impedes the likelihood of reproduction, yet found a usefulness in some arbitrary way later on.

We don't need the notion of a cosmic wizard causing them to evolve when we have an answer from well demonstrated natural mechanism.

Additionally, there's a strong correlation between sexual orientation and androgyny. The stereotype of catty gay men and butch lesbians is not just a stereotype. I think this too serves a purpose, allowing gay couples to effectively fill both mother and father roles. Studies in both psychology and zoology have shown that same gender couples are equally capable as parents.

1) The proportion of gay's that are either "catty" or "butch" is a minority.

2) The fact that they are no less capable parents only shows sexual orientation doesn't have relevance in raising youth. This would be an argument in opposition to anti-homosexuality but it doesn't lend credence to the notion that a deity caused them to evolve in the slightest.

However, as I've said, this benefit to society is indirect. I can't see how a tribe with gays would be at such an advantage over a tribe with no gays as far as which one would survive.

They would be disadvantageous to the short term survival as it lowers the chances of reproduction, however if it is outweighed by positive traits that assist survival then the fact this trait exists is meaningless. It seems to me you have a fundamental misunderstanding of natural selection, so let me clarify a few things:

1) Species do not adapt

2) Not all mutations are beneficial

3) Not all non-beneficial traits are selected against

4) Beneficial function in one area can be detrimental function in another

5) Traits are not necessarily initially beneficial

Non social animals typically have more primitive parenting patters. I mean "primitive" in the biological sense of the word, which is to say no family structure. Ergo, your point is moot since such animals don't raise their young and therefore have no need of adoption.

And this again seems to argue that they have no ultimate purpose other than to adopt the young of unable heterosexuals.

Homosexual adoption is most likely a side effect of having homosexuals and orphans in a social structure, there is absolutely no need to invoke a deity to explain this relationship.

Current thinking is that homosexuality, in males at least, is the result of the environment in the womb. A woman's later born sons, that is after the first son, are more likely to be gay. Not sure what prevailing hypothesis exists to explain lesbians.

So some hormonal irregularity then. This makes it more likely that homosexuality is happenstance if it can be attributed not to the genetics of the homosexual themselves, but to a mutation in the mother that causes a hormonal release of a certain kind during pregnancy.

Therefore we have a greater chance still of homosexuality prevailing genetically as this gene would be passed down more frequently amongst heterosexual couples.

It might be interesting to see studies on whether or not bisexuals are more likely to have a gay child, which would lend weight to your thinking on the subject.

Perhaps

Unfortunately, we're going to need to get a lot more comfortable about sexual orientation as a society before such a study is even possible.

Studies of that nature are already being done, there is no need to wait for social attitudes to change to preform it.

Finding out how many closeted gays there are in the country is hard enough. It's not uncommon for bisexuals to relate that they didn't find out about their versatile nature until later in life. I surmise that there may be more out there that never find out. What we think of as "bisexuality" may be far more common than anyone suspects, especially since we think of heterosexuality in rather purist terms.

Sure, but this lends no credence to your argument.

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I will give it a Whirl

The strongest and most empirically confirmed evidence indicates an early universe with conditions which align best with the predictions of Big Bang Cosmological models.

Agreeed

Big Bang Theory is the most reasonable explanation for the beginning of the known universe provided by the community of science.

Agreed.

If there was a Big bang, the entire event would have occured in accordance to pre-existant physical laws since without the existence of such laws there would have not existed the mechanics for such an occurance. i.e, there would have been no known reason for instability of the singularity.

Agreed

All material originated at the Appearance of the singularity

First problem: There is no reason to believe that the singularity ever "appeared" (was not there and then was) The first law of thermodynamics states that energy can neither be created nor destroyed and as thermodynamics is compatible with Big Bang cosmology, to say the singularity "appeared" is mistaken.

and the subsequent Big bang.

You are internally contradicting yourself now. Even if your above premise was true (which it isn't), matter cannot "originate" both at the singularity and the big bang. We have reason for believing that it was created in the big bang along with space and time.

The existence of physical laws absent physical material (material in the most strict sense) is supernatural by definition (Unless we include an intelligent and creative agent as being part of nature)

Wrong again, energy is not supernatural. Matter is quantized energy in various amounts and charges, but energy is not necessarily matter.

An intelligent, creative force would only be "natural" (in the sense of naturalism) if he was made of matter and/or energy.

The idea of the purposeless[/i] pre-existence of Electromagnetism without the existence of energy or particles, or gravity independent of mass, or the strong nuclear and weak forces independent of nuclear particles is completely untenable on the face.

I agree it's a stupid idea, so it's a good thing that it's a complete Straw-man argument.

Seeing as your initial premises are all flawed the conclusion is already logically invalid, but i'll continue for the hell of it...

Whatever gave rise to the laws of science could not be a product of the scientific process.

A "scientific process" is one performed by scientists. I assume you mean "natural process", if so, what reasons do you have for asserting that a natural process cannot give rise to natural law?

I see no reason at all to accept this assumption.

The only known phenomenon which gives rise to codes and laws and then enacts such laws thus creating original forms and systems is "thinking".

Not true. Algorithms with feedback loops are more than capable of generating complex systems that develop their own rules over time. As the code develops you can even discover rules that apply to one scale of the system that make no sense when applied to the constituent system.

an example would be governments and games, computer programs, and music. All of the aforementioned are typically first designed subjectively and subsequently created in the phenomenal world.

You have just shown examples of design by intelligence and then asserted that all possible patterns are therefore designed by intelligence. This is a bare assertion fallacy.

Go and Google nature in music if you want some natural systems making patterns that resemble human music. The examples are endless.

Outside of thinking there can be no possible explanation for the origin of "scientific process". Scientific processes cannot explain its own origin-

Firstly, the scientific process was invented by humans, what you should be addressing is "natural law".

Secondly, saying that there can be no possible explanation for the origin of "natural law" without a mind is another bare assertion fallacy, you have not demonstrated that this is the case.

Yet thinking has in many instances created processes from nothing but the imagination.

Not thinking alone, it was able to conceive of a process, but the actual application of the mechanism was within the confines of matter, energy and natural law.

Therefore I propose that the Universe evinces the existence of a prime thinker which created the process by which all else came into existence and further I assert that such entity must exist by logical necessity.

You have only demonstrated a flawed understanding of the Big-Bang cosmology and the ability to commit numerous bare assertion fallacies.

Do you want to reform your argument taking into account the refutations?

Also, answer this question: How is god a solution to the problem of existence? Saying god solves the problem of the existence of nature only moves the question to "why is there super-nature rather than nothing" a question that your God hypothesis is incapable of answering.