[ExI] BICEP2 and the Fermi paradox

[William Flynn Wallace]

People in general and Congress in particular are extremely good at ignoring
and denying facts.  "Logic resistant compartments" is an old term but a
goodie.  We will never get rid of religion.  Trite but true:  people will
believe what they want to believe. billw


On Tue, Apr 8, 2014 at 9:13 AM, John Clark <johnkclark at gmail.com> wrote:

> On Tue, Apr 1, 2014 at 1:22 AM, spike <spike66 at att.net> wrote:
>
> > A few years ago on this list I used this very argument against Nick
>> Bostrom's anthropic argument in favor of us being in a simulation -
>> although at that time inflation was more of a hypothesis rather than a
>> theory slouching towards becoming a fact, as it is doing today. There are
>> so may more young civilizations than older ones that no matter how popular
>> ancestor simulations are, you are vanishingly unlikely to be in one of them
>>
>
> And that was a very very good point!
>
> > what we are seeing here is evolution of a religion.  The successful
>> modern religions are catching on to an important aspect for their survival:
>> don't fight science.  Rather, spin it to an advantage, regardless of which
>> way science takes us.  Religions which fight science are always going to
>> lose in the long run, because science has evidence on its side.
>>
>
> The trick that religion needs to do is what so many intellectuals have
> done when the God theory became untenable, abandon the idea of God but not
> the English word G-O-D. Just fuzz up the word so much it could mean
> anything and then religious people get to say all sorts of vacuous but
> pleasant sounding things like "I believe in God because there are things
> more powerful than myself". Of course that means that a bulldozer is God,
> but never mind.
>
>   John K Clark
>
>
>
>
>
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