Is your gods punishment fair?

[Confused]

I am new to this site, so please bare with me if I seem a little of center. I will try to stick to the rules. After reading these threads for many years, I am just now getting the courage to start to ask questions of my own. feel free to correct me if I mess up.

Ok, lets for the sake of this thread say that the god of christianity is all knowing. Lets say the he knew what you were going to do before you were born, but loved you so much he still allowed your birth to occur. Let us even go far out into the left field and say that he knew what choices you would make in all decisions although he didn't force you to make them. I am not arguing free-will vs determinism. I am only wondering how it is that this god who knew what you would do, loved you so much he allowed your birth to do what you were going to do, and then punished you for doing what he knew you were going to do. If he already knew what would happen, and then allowed it to happen, how can he then turn around and sentence you to eternity in hell for what he knew you would do and allowed you to do?

Maybe I am missing some logical link here, but it seems to me that if this god knew the birth of an individual would result in the torture and death of even one person, isn't this god the actual guilty party for setting into motion an inevitable event? Is this the god that so many people would like for me to follow?

So does anyone know:
1) Does god love you so much that knowing what you would do and what you would become, he still allowed your birth so that you might know his love?

2) Is god some sadistic being who knows what you are going to do, allows you to be born, gets a cheap thrill watching you carry out some of the most sadistic crimes against humanity before sending you to the eternal fires of hell?

3) There is no god.

Personally, I have to say that there isn't enough available information to make an informed decision, but logic tells me its 3. If there is a god-fearing individual who can logically tell me otherwise, I would love to hear it.

[dunsapy]

No, the wind tunnel is not moving the hinges as they are locked after each change.

What is happening is that you start with a random configuration (like the one in the diagram). As the wind tunnel is turned on the drag levels are known. One of the hinges is randomly changed. If this reduces the drag it is kept and then next another hinge is moved with the first one in it's new place. If this one doesn't improve it, it is not kept and another change is made. It is done over and over again and after just 30 attempts the perfect solution was found.

This is evolution and shows that the model does work

The experiment, what shape are you trying to achieve for the experiment to be a success? ( after the 30 tries)

[Scotracer]

No, the wind tunnel is not moving the hinges as they are locked after each change.

What is happening is that you start with a random configuration (like the one in the diagram). As the wind tunnel is turned on the drag levels are known. One of the hinges is randomly changed. If this reduces the drag it is kept and then next another hinge is moved with the first one in it's new place. If this one doesn't improve it, it is not kept and another change is made. It is done over and over again and after just 30 attempts the perfect solution was found.

This is evolution and shows that the model does work

The experiment, what shape are you trying to achieve for the experiment to be a success? ( after the 30 tries)

The perfect solution is a flat plate (where only skin drag is a problem). And it was achieved after just 30 attempts whereas if we had used blind random changes (what many people think evolution is - falsely) it could have taken 350,000,000 attempts.

Obviously in reality evolution does not have an ultimate goal, but what was done to stop further changes after a flat plate is that if you then change one hinge drag will increase and as a result, the change is not kept (the random change represents a random mutation. For this final one think of an animal that is suited to its environment, such as a lion, and then a random mutation causes it to run slower and therefore not able to catch any food. This means the animal can't survive and reproduce to pass on the mutation and as such it is not kept)

Evolution is a natural way that animals become suited to their environment...and this is what makes people think they are designed when in fact they are not. These small changes, over millions and billions of years (think if there are 8 mutations a year for humans...that's billions of mutations over that time period) end up making massive changes to the organism.

Isn't science awesome?

[dunsapy]

The perfect solution is a flat plate (where only skin drag is a problem). And it was achieved after just 30 attempts whereas if we had used blind random changes (what many people think evolution is - falsely) it could have taken 350,000,000 attempts.

Obviously in reality evolution does not have an ultimate goal, but what was done to stop further changes after a flat plate is that if you then change one hinge drag will increase and as a result, the change is not kept (the random change represents a random mutation. For this final one think of an animal that is suited to its environment, such as a lion, and then a random mutation causes it to run slower and therefore not able to catch any food. This means the animal can't survive and reproduce to pass on the mutation and as such it is not kept)

Evolution is a natural way that animals become suited to their environment...and this is what makes people think they are designed when in fact they are not. These small changes, over millions and billions of years (think if there are 8 mutations a year for humans...that's billions of mutations over that time period) end up making massive changes to the organism.

Isn't science awesome?

Don't get me wrong I like science, and would have like to study something in biology. I also think science have discovered many interesting things. So don't think I am against science. But I do think science loses in way, when it comes to this question on the start to life and evolution. And biogenesis is getting closer to creation. Which is going to have to happen.

OK the experiment. This is nothing to do with life. It is more to do with physics.
This is flawed. This not evolution. Right from the start the wind is trying to make the plates flat, becasue that is the least resistance, to the wind. the ones that have tension on them but can move will try to get to the least resistance. This means that the wind will have less effect on the plates , from then on, becasue the tension is effectively higher, becasue there is not much wind pressure on those plates, ( no wind) when they are aligned to the wind. The adjusting on one of the plates, gives you 1 to 50 chances. 30 times seems reasonable.
Because man has set up the experiment to achieve a certain result, from the beginning. This is inteligence.
Now for life, and DNA, there is a huge difference.
lets say you have 4 dice all different colors each dice has 50 sides.. With every throw each colored dice has to come up with the correct number , and each throw gives you 1 letter of a sentence( so that all dice have to be correct everytime). Now you have to throw the dice 1 million times, for one game.
Could you ever get a 100% game ? The catch is that everytime a mistake comes up, you get a weird distorted animal, with bit's of eye hanging of some where, or bits of bones etc. There should be millions of these and maybe never a completed animal. But what we see is completed animals, not the other ones. We see that today also.

[Zzyzx]

.

Isn't science awesome?

Science is truly awesome. Think of what systematic study of nature (science) has provided since my mother was born a century ago (in 1905).

There were no (or practically no) automobiles, trucks, tractors. Transport was by animal power excepting railroads and ships. There was no electric service to the public, little or no indoor plumbing, no refrigeration or air conditioning, no television, radio or computers.

Medicine was in its infancy at the beginning of the Twentieth Century. One of my grandfathers died of appendicitis. Antibacterial drugs were unknown, many diseases were very poorly understood.

Mom lived to see all of those things PLUS space travel to the moon, satellites, computers and even the Internet (she died in the late 1990s).

ALL of those advances were provided by science. None of them were provided by theology.

[joer]

Cmass wrote:

I have a desire to know if god exists

I just found this on the internet:

[center]Finding You


When you once start out to find God,
that is the conclusive proof that God
has already found you.
[/center]

.

I just found this on the internet:

What a great example of a purely emotional appeal that devoid of substance. Fundamental Religion at its Finest.

Hey Dunsapy, where are you? I can't see you through the horde of admirers you have. Any way Cmass I'm here. I guess you couldn't get a word in edgewise. But this is the last post I posted to you in response to the discussion we were having. Peace my friend.

Zzy, good to see you. I'm glad you enjoyed the emotional appeal of my last post, but sorry you missed the substance. Sometimes a little change in perspective will help you see it. I thought the picture of the baby grasping a man's thumb, was an image of manliness and innocence combined.

The strenght and love of a Father with a gentleness for the "being" of his joint creation with his wife and God as partners.

I have to admit Zzy. It is pretty sweet and necessary (IMHO) imagery.

Peace my friend.

[Scotracer]

The perfect solution is a flat plate (where only skin drag is a problem). And it was achieved after just 30 attempts whereas if we had used blind random changes (what many people think evolution is - falsely) it could have taken 350,000,000 attempts.

Obviously in reality evolution does not have an ultimate goal, but what was done to stop further changes after a flat plate is that if you then change one hinge drag will increase and as a result, the change is not kept (the random change represents a random mutation. For this final one think of an animal that is suited to its environment, such as a lion, and then a random mutation causes it to run slower and therefore not able to catch any food. This means the animal can't survive and reproduce to pass on the mutation and as such it is not kept)

Evolution is a natural way that animals become suited to their environment...and this is what makes people think they are designed when in fact they are not. These small changes, over millions and billions of years (think if there are 8 mutations a year for humans...that's billions of mutations over that time period) end up making massive changes to the organism.

Isn't science awesome?

Don't get me wrong I like science, and would have like to study something in biology. I also think science have discovered many interesting things. So don't think I am against science. But I do think science loses in way, when it comes to this question on the start to life and evolution. And biogenesis is getting closer to creation. Which is going to have to happen.

OK the experiment. This is nothing to do with life. It is more to do with physics.
This is flawed. This not evolution. Right from the start the wind is trying to make the plates flat, becasue that is the least resistance, to the wind. the ones that have tension on them but can move will try to get to the least resistance. This means that the wind will have less effect on the plates , from then on, becasue the tension is effectively higher, becasue there is not much wind pressure on those plates, ( no wind) when they are aligned to the wind. The adjusting on one of the plates, gives you 1 to 50 chances. 30 times seems reasonable.
Because man has set up the experiment to achieve a certain result, from the beginning. This is inteligence.
Now for life, and DNA, there is a huge difference.
lets say you have 4 dice all different colors each dice has 50 sides.. With every throw each colored dice has to come up with the correct number , and each throw gives you 1 letter of a sentence( so that all dice have to be correct everytime). Now you have to throw the dice 1 million times, for one game.
Could you ever get a 100% game ? The catch is that everytime a mistake comes up, you get a weird distorted animal, with bit's of eye hanging of some where, or bits of bones etc. There should be millions of these and maybe never a completed animal. But what we see is completed animals, not the other ones. We see that today also.

It is a relevant example as the purpose is to get the best configuration for the environment (least drag) - this is exactly what happens after evolution has taken its course. Analogously, Wind resistance is the same as Environmental Pressures (such as the need for more fur for warmth, or a longer neck/taller animal to get the food higher up in the trees). It does work - beautifully actually. You see, your idea of the wind forcing the plate into a specific form is exactly what evolution does. You just answered your own problem

Your analogy is false as you are trying to get the final solution from your initial conditions (like going from replicating amino acids to humans in one fell-swoop). Also it doesn't take into account inherited traits (the single most fundamental thing with regards to evolution).

I really don't understand why people are so unwilling to accept Evolutionary Theory. It is so beautiful and so evident (hell, it happens every year with the influenza virus hence the need for a new flu vaccine) - it is my favourite scientific theory, just pipping General Relativity.

[FinalEnigma]

Dunsapy. Scotracer has JUST explained to you why evolution is not random and why a random test will be flawed and not in any way representative of evolution. Then you immediately use a random test to show how unlikely it is.

Why on earth are you arguing about what evolution is with people who clearly are more versed in the subject?

this will probably be way too complicated, but imagine a game.

each team builds one robot and sends it into a maze to get to the exit on the other side. if it runs into another team's robot, it can fight or run away. if it is destroyed, its game over for the robot. At the end of the round, each robot that makes it through the maze creates five copies of itself, which undergo one completely random change which is not affected by any logical process- it's totally random. All the robots with a change(or mutation) that makes them fail to survive the maze, dies. game over for it. every one that gets through goes on to the next round.

This game closely resembles evolution. each 'round' is one generation. There is some random change, yes. but the ones with bad changes, die, the ones with good changes, make more robots. Eventually all these robots will evolve in different ways to become better at getting through the maze. THAT is evolution. not the random games you and other theists frequently propose. and intelligence is NOT guiding this is any way. once the first robot enters the maze, no human touches anything.

and before you say that the fact that human created the robots to begin with invalidates this, it doesn't, because evolution says nothing about how life got there. it starts with the life that is there already - like this game. it doesn't care how you build your robot, it jsut makes them evolve.

to the science people out there - that would be a really fun game wouldn't it?

[joer]

Scotracer! Please to meet you. I love science. And I don’t find any unresolvable conflicts between science and God. Science is the discovery of the processes and dynamics of God’s Creation. And Evolution is one of those processes. You wrote:

All the fact that we don't know how life began shows is that we don't know how life began. There is, at no point, any reasonable justification for claiming it was a deity (that has no evidence for its existence) that did it. "Goddunnit", I'm sure.

And if you wish to speak to another scientist - here I am. I fully understand how science works and use it every day. So please, don't even try to pass your arguments across as legitimate or honest as I'll just call you out on them. It saves much time.

Evolution is indeed a verified fact. And can be proven to happen. And has been - many, many times.

Speaking of God as deity you wrote: (that has no evidence for its existence). But I believe you are referring only to objective evidence. And you leave out the evidence of experiential reality. That reality we experience weather it has an established objective basis or not. You wrote:

Evolution is indeed a verified fact. And can be proven to happen. And has been - many, many times.

You are also right. But the Subjective choice to see that as a process of God or NOT. is personally made by the Non-believer or believer equally.

So for the non-believer there is no conclusive evidence of God and For the Believer God is seen all around him. In Nature, in Objective reality, Subjective Reality, Science, Religion, Spirituality, as well as in each other. The believer sees you as a child of God Scotracer!

Isn’t this recent find on Dark Energy cool! God made dark energy and dark matter. We don’t have objective proof yet. But I got a heads up on it from a 1955 revelation from Chicago. So it’s wonderful seeing us become further and further defined in our Objective conceptual frame of reference for reality as we scientifically perceive it. It’s so exciting!

Refined Hubble Constant Narrows Possible Explanations For Dark Energy
Today, 8:15 PM EDT | Post edited: Today, 8:15 PM EDT .

ScienceDaily (May 8, 2009) — Whatever dark energy is, explanations for it have less wiggle room following a Hubble Space Telescope observation that has refined the measurement of the universe's present expansion rate to a precision where the error is smaller than five percent.
Link to full article

Link to full article

Keck Telescope And the Keck telescope might end up in Hawaii or a Chilean desert. I think the desert may have better environmental optical conditions. But i would worry about political unrest blocking our access at some time in the future.

http://www.astronomy.com/asy/default.aspx?c=a&id=8000

Nice meeting you Scot. I enjoy your posts.

[Beto]

I liked that you used the word biological evolution. This is what I think of when I use the word evolution. That life started somehow, then evolution happened for all the life we see today.

Who's making a different claim? Would you quote it?

There have been 4 legged animals around long before scientists. So science is trying to copy something that has already been done.

Science tries to copy something that's there. "Been done" is a very loaded expression, and you have no good reason to use it.

The other thing is that science is using intelligence to copy it. They get the materials together, with much expertise to do it.

You missed the point. Is there one single intelligence guiding the whole process of robotic evolution? Change of "memetic material" is behind robotics and the evolution of other fields of human study and thought, as changes in "genetic material" are behind biological evolution. Neither demonstrate signs of being driven by any single entity.

And you are only copying the movements. Can this robot survive in the bush, can it survive on it's own, can it mate and make little big dogs, etc.

Before robots could move, they couldn't. You would say the same thing about movement before they developed to that point. Again, paradoxically, I still think you're lacking imagination. Which is strange given what you conjure up to account for things you don't understand.

So you are proving creation, because you have just said that all these scientist made this BigDog. That is creation.

This robot serves a point concerning evolution, and how its "mechanisms" need not an intelligent agent behind them... not the "beginning" of "life".

For it to happen in evolution means no interference from intelligence.

There's no intelligence guiding the underlining mechanisms behind robotic evolution. Obviously there's intelligence in the "changes" of robotic evolution. The "changes" of biological evolution have been observed without intelligent interference. That is beyond question.

That is why for science to bring about life in an experiment, only proves creation. Not that it could happen on it's own.

Depends on the conditions assembled, and how closely they can resemble naturally occurring conditions. That seems obvious enough to me.

[Scotracer]

Nice to meet you too, joer. I did raise a small smile at, for once, being greeted a sincere welcome on the internet.

I have theorised for many years that the main difference between a believer (in whichever religion) and a non-believer is perception. There is such a gulf between the two that one may never see eye-to-eye with your counterpart. I was brought up in a completely neutral environment, as my parents knew I was intelligent enough to make the correct choices for me. After studying science for so long, and working as a scientist (I'm currently working as a Mechanical Engineer for those interested) I saw nothing that made me think that there is a deity behind it. But at the same time there isn't anything that says there is none (although the modern religions are demonstrably wrong, along with their scriptures). I suppose technically I would be Agnostic but I do not like the idea of purporting myself as not knowing something - one describes himself by what he knows.

I tend to not get involved in the actual "does god xxx exist" as by definition one cannot prove it doesn't (and being supernatural, science can't look at it). I am here as a representative of the scientific community (humbly I accept that I am not the best scientist in the world, but you do what you can) and strive to teach real science. You will (and may have already) notice my posts are purely on scientific topics as I have little interest if a god exists or not - I just want to understand the physical reality we live in. I wouldn't be here at all if it weren't for those pesky critters not accepting evolution

As you said, it is subjective interpretation of reality, which is based on perception of the world. I have no problem with such a view but when people try to use their position to subvert scientific progress or proliferation I get very aggitated. If I've offended anyone in my previous posts - I apologise, I just love science so.

I do have to admit, I do like to intellectually masturbate (forgive any rude mental images that produces ) over cosmological science. It isn't my field but it is mind-bending in both scope and attraction. Dark matter & Energy are concepts I shall leave to the quantum mechanist's as I feel more comfortable with physics that actually says what I'm working with exists

I am waiting for the day we figure out what was "before" the big bang or at least what caused it - truly the physics question of our age.

May science be with you!