[ExI] The Meaning of the Universe

Wed Jun 15 17:13:37 UTC 2016

On Wed, Jun 15, 2016 at 11:03 AM, Will Steinberg <steinberg.will at gmail.com>
wrote:

> > 
> god is the sum consciousness of the universe and all possible universes.
>

And if God is a coconut then God exists because coconuts exist. I think
words should mean something and if God means an omnipotent omniscient
conscious being who created the universe then God does not exist. However
many disagree and although they are perfectly willing to abandon the idea
of God they are not willing
to abandon 
the English word "G-O-D" and
thus 
redefine
the word
 in
such a general
 way that only a fool would say there is no God. So if you redefined "God"
to mean the sum of all coconuts then God exists, and

if you redefined "God" to mean the sum of all consciousness

then
God 
also 
exists; but it's a silly word game.

> > 
> It makes sense to think that, if disparate neurons make our consciousness,
> then greater interconnected consciousnesses make a bigger emergent mind.
>

Yes, the different neurons in the bone box on your shoulders are wired
together and that makes your consciousness; but your neurons are not wired
to my neurons, if they were we'd be the same person, and we're not.  

> > 
> atheism, which is a lack of belief and a lack of caring about knowledge.
>

That is just nonsense. 

> > 
> The hard, "capital-A-for-" Atheist movement is a head-in-the-sand
> movement.  Most of them know very LITTLE about science
>

Atheists like 
Richard Dawkins
 or Lawrence Krauss?

> > 
> Science is a tool created by humans to gather information.
>

Yes.

> > 
> We use it to construct models that are able to make good predictions about
> the world around us
>

Yes, and religion uses the fear of death to enable some people to gain
control of other people.

> 
> "Atheism" is a nebulous non-existent viewpoint.
>

Nebulous
? 
non-existent
? There are just 2 ideas behind atheism, they exist and are clear as a
bell:

1) There is no invisible man in the sky who created the universe.
2) Even if there were it would explain nothing about the mystery of
existence,

> > 
> It is the view that we should NOT try to ask why consciousness exists,
>

Not true. Atheists say it's fine to ask any question including why
consciousness exists, but what is not fine is to claim to have an answer to
a question when you do not. The God hypothesis cannot explain
consciousness, in fact "God did it" can never explain anything unless you
explain exactly how God did it. Science hasn't explained why there is
something rather than nothing, but it has explained why there is a lot
rather than very little;  Science hasn't explained everything but religion
has NEVER explained anything.

> 
> You should explore gnostic and mystic traditions of religion.

Why? Name one valid fact about reality discovered by a religious person
or one good moral act performed by a religious person that a nonreligious
person could not have. And yes I'm aware of the fact that Newton was
religious, but I think he made his discoveries in spite of his religion not
because of it, and a nonreligious person could have made those discoveries
well before the 17th century if there were any nonreligious people around
back then, but there weren't.  However we've learned a thing or two since
then and there are now.

> > 
> it
> [God] 
> can't turn you into a tomato without following a causal process that would
> actually turn you into a tomato.
>

Then what good is God?  Why not eliminate the middle man, go with the
causal process, and kick God to the curb?

God is a useless fifth wheel. 

 John K Clark
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