Henotheism and Atheism

[Fort Fun Indiana]

Man has always used gods to explain what they didn't comprehend.

Yes. There was a god for everything. Thousands of them. That number shrunk to the 10s, then a handful. Then, one god. As i once heard someone say, they are getting closer to the truth each time.

 

[ding]

Man has always used gods to explain what they didn't comprehend.

Yes. There was a god for everything. Thousands of them. That number shrunk to the 10s, then a handful. Then, one god. As i once heard someone say, they are getting closer to the truth each time.

Actually monotheism began with Abraham. Moreover the God of Abraham had two unique qualities; He was not embodied in the material form and He made morality the basis of His relationship with man.

 

[ding]

When you can provide a perception of what you have looked for that isn't a fairy tale, we can talk.

English, please.

I don't believe I could have said it any clearer. When you can provide a perception of what you have looked for that isn't a fairy tale, we can talk. Cause you ain't never given the existence of God serious consideration.

 

[ding]

The universe is just a place where things can happen. We are the result of trillions upon trillions to the trillionth power of random events. We are insignificant compared to the entirety of the universe.

The evolution of space and time has proceeded in a very logical and sequential fashion. Every cause had an effect and every effect had a cause.

Do you or don't you agree?

And some of those causes are random events. Liken it to the throwing of trillions of dice each having multiple sides.

The throwing of the dice is a cause but the result of that known cause is an astronomical number of random conditions. Those random conditions can then become causes of untold more random conditions.

There is no predictable sequence

Do you believe in cause and effect?

 

[Blues Man]

Man has always used gods to explain what they didn't comprehend. As we have understood more and more of our environment we have discarded those gods. The belief in some everlasting spirit is nothing but a manifestation of our fear of death and that we will somehow continue to live on after death.

God hasn't been about the physical world, but how to live in a physical world.

Human used gods as explanations for what they did not understand.

How many gods have been discarded by humans over the eons? We used them to explain just about everything from birth to thunderstorms.

Now we use a god to explain the inception of the universe

 

[Blues Man]

If the universe has a purpose then I must have a purpose. If the universe has no purpose then I must have no purpose.

The definition of purpose is the reason for which something is done or created or for which something exists. If a constant presence of mind intentionally created the universe, then it was created for a purpose. If the universe was not created by a constant presence of mind then it would have not been intentionally created and it is just matter and energy doing what matter and energy do.

Do you agree?

So you think that your purpose is defined by something outside yourself?

You are operating on a big if and instead of regarding that if as a hypothetical you are operating as if that if then hypothetical condition is proven fact.

Purpose is not defined by the creator of anything. It is defined by the user.

The inventor of a wrench can try to tell me that the purpose of the wrench is to apply torque to a particular size nut. But if I use that wrench to strike a person in self defense I have defined the purpose of the wrench in that instant to be a weapon.

So purpose is subjective and defined by the person using a tool not the person who created the tool.

And I see nothing contradictory in believing the universe was not created for a purpose. The universe simply is what it is.

Purpose is defined by what something was made for. We were made to know and to create.

A hammer was made to hammer. A lawn mower was made to cut grass. The universe was made to create intelligence.

No purpose is defined by the intent of user.
I can use a knife to cut food, chop wood or stab a person. I decide the purpose of that knife.
If I use a lawn mower to kill a person than I defined that lawn mowers purpose in that instance.


And we do not how how the universe came to be so for a human being being so insignificant to claim he knows the purpose of the universe is outrageously arrogant and not to mention conceited.

As I said we humans have a penchant for grandiose thinking and we think so much of ourselves that we like to think we are the very image of a god and that the universe was made just for us.

I hate to burst your bubble but we are an insignificant life form in one galaxy among a couple trillion galaxies.

 

[Blues Man]

Looking at it from an human evolutionary perspective we could say prehistoric man's only purpose was to survive and procreate. Since we are primates we can assume we evolved as social creatures. The culmination of that social evolution is what has made us what we are. We are no longer simply a product of the natural environment and we are more a product of our societies than anything else.

Throughout history every society has overwhelmingly held the belief that man is more than just matter and that there is a higher power than man. From the atheist's vantage point these beliefs AND BEHAVIORS exist because of evolutionary forces. But the reality is that even that argument confirms that these beliefs AND BEHAVIORS offer a functional advantage over materialism. According to natural selection there are two main components; functional advantage and transfer of functional advantage to the next generation. So even natural selection confirms that these beliefs AND BEHAVIORS lead to success. Otherwise, according to natural selection, these beliefs AND BEHAVIORS would have been abandoned long ago. As mankind has gained more and more knowledge of his natural surroundings his desire for spirituality has not diminished. In fact, the more materialistic mankind became the less satisfied mankind became. It's all very logical.

Man has always used gods to explain what they didn't comprehend. As we have understood more and more of our environment we have discarded those gods. The belief in some everlasting spirit is nothing but a manifestation of our fear of death and that we will somehow continue to live on after death.

And I'll grant you that religion did have a societal effect as all measures of control do. When the ruling class can get the masses to think that if they behaved than there would be some reward beyond the misery of their existence then you get an obedient populace and that makes the success of a society more likely not to mention that it enriches the powers that be, including the religious orders which gave those institutions even more power.

So we boil it all down to the biggest of our unanswered questions.

How did we get here and what happens after we die.

We don't really know what caused the inception of the universe and we certainly don't understand anything but a fraction of our universe. And we may never understand it. We as sentient creature that fear death like to think that our consciousness (spirit) that makes us the individuals we are won't simply vanish when we die.

Looking at it from an human evolutionary perspective we could say prehistoric man's only purpose was to survive and procreate. Since we are primates we can assume we evolved as social creatures. The culmination of that social evolution is what has made us what we are. We are no longer simply a product of the natural environment and we are more a product of our societies than anything else.

Throughout history every society has overwhelmingly held the belief that man is more than just matter and that there is a higher power than man. From the atheist's vantage point these beliefs AND BEHAVIORS exist because of evolutionary forces. But the reality is that even that argument confirms that these beliefs AND BEHAVIORS offer a functional advantage over materialism. According to natural selection there are two main components; functional advantage and transfer of functional advantage to the next generation. So even natural selection confirms that these beliefs AND BEHAVIORS lead to success. Otherwise, according to natural selection, these beliefs AND BEHAVIORS would have been abandoned long ago. As mankind has gained more and more knowledge of his natural surroundings his desire for spirituality has not diminished. In fact, the more materialistic mankind became the less satisfied mankind became. It's all very logical.

Man has always used gods to explain what they didn't comprehend. As we have understood more and more of our environment we have discarded those gods. The belief in some everlasting spirit is nothing but a manifestation of our fear of death and that we will somehow continue to live on after death.

And I'll grant you that religion did have a societal effect as all measures of control do. When the ruling class can get the masses to think that if they behaved than there would be some reward beyond the misery of their existence then you get an obedient populace and that makes the success of a society more likely not to mention that it enriches the powers that be, including the religious orders which gave those institutions even more power.

So we boil it all down to the biggest of our unanswered questions.

How did we get here and what happens after we die.

We don't really know what caused the inception of the universe and we certainly don't understand anything but a fraction of our universe. And we may never understand it. We as sentient creature that fear death like to think that our consciousness (spirit) that makes us the individuals we are won't simply vanish when we die. So we will continue to speculate the existence of creators and afterlives until we can actually understand them. And since I believe we may be incapable of understanding them due to the physical limitations of our brains then we will always speculate about the mystical as a cause for the physical world we do not understand

And yet natural selection confirms that belief in God is functionally superior to materialism.

No it doesn't.

 

[Blues Man]

The universe is just a place where things can happen. We are the result of trillions upon trillions to the trillionth power of random events. We are insignificant compared to the entirety of the universe.

The evolution of space and time has proceeded in a very logical and sequential fashion. Every cause had an effect and every effect had a cause.

Do you or don't you agree?

And some of those causes are random events. Liken it to the throwing of trillions of dice each having multiple sides.

The throwing of the dice is a cause but the result of that known cause is an astronomical number of random conditions. Those random conditions can then become causes of untold more random conditions.

There is no predictable sequence

The evolution of space and time say otherwise. So does the theory of evolution.

You only say that because we came into the movie late.

No one was around to witness the inception of the universe.

We tend to think of time as linear. It very well may not be.

 

[Blues Man]

The universe is just a place where things can happen. We are the result of trillions upon trillions to the trillionth power of random events. We are insignificant compared to the entirety of the universe.

The evolution of space and time has proceeded in a very logical and sequential fashion. Every cause had an effect and every effect had a cause.

Do you or don't you agree?

And some of those causes are random events. Liken it to the throwing of trillions of dice each having multiple sides.

The throwing of the dice is a cause but the result of that known cause is an astronomical number of random conditions. Those random conditions can then become causes of untold more random conditions.

There is no predictable sequence

Do you believe in cause and effect?

Only if time is linear.

And like I said random events can be causes in themselves so if a random event causes a chain of events then that chain of events was not predictable

 

[ding]

If the universe has a purpose then I must have a purpose. If the universe has no purpose then I must have no purpose.

The definition of purpose is the reason for which something is done or created or for which something exists. If a constant presence of mind intentionally created the universe, then it was created for a purpose. If the universe was not created by a constant presence of mind then it would have not been intentionally created and it is just matter and energy doing what matter and energy do.

Do you agree?

So you think that your purpose is defined by something outside yourself?

You are operating on a big if and instead of regarding that if as a hypothetical you are operating as if that if then hypothetical condition is proven fact.

Purpose is not defined by the creator of anything. It is defined by the user.

The inventor of a wrench can try to tell me that the purpose of the wrench is to apply torque to a particular size nut. But if I use that wrench to strike a person in self defense I have defined the purpose of the wrench in that instant to be a weapon.

So purpose is subjective and defined by the person using a tool not the person who created the tool.

And I see nothing contradictory in believing the universe was not created for a purpose. The universe simply is what it is.

Purpose is defined by what something was made for. We were made to know and to create.

A hammer was made to hammer. A lawn mower was made to cut grass. The universe was made to create intelligence.

No purpose is defined by the intent of user.
I can use a knife to cut food, chop wood or stab a person. I decide the purpose of that knife.
If I use a lawn mower to kill a person than I defined that lawn mowers purpose in that instance.


And we do not how how the universe came to be so for a human being being so insignificant to claim he knows the purpose of the universe is outrageously arrogant and not to mention conceited.

As I said we humans have a penchant for grandiose thinking and we think so much of ourselves that we like to think we are the very image of a god and that the universe was made just for us.

I hate to burst your bubble but we are an insignificant life form in one galaxy among a couple trillion galaxies.

The purpose of a lawn mower is to cut grass no matter how many people you kill with it.

The purpose of a knife is to cut.

There is nothing special about humans. Being the pinnacle of creation means we are the most complex thing the universe has produced. The universe is an intelligence creating machine. Intelligence is written into the laws of nature and the fabric of existence.

 

[ding]

The universe is just a place where things can happen. We are the result of trillions upon trillions to the trillionth power of random events. We are insignificant compared to the entirety of the universe.

The evolution of space and time has proceeded in a very logical and sequential fashion. Every cause had an effect and every effect had a cause.

Do you or don't you agree?

And some of those causes are random events. Liken it to the throwing of trillions of dice each having multiple sides.

The throwing of the dice is a cause but the result of that known cause is an astronomical number of random conditions. Those random conditions can then become causes of untold more random conditions.

There is no predictable sequence

Do you believe in cause and effect?

Only if time is linear.

And like I said random events can be causes in themselves so if a random event causes a chain of events then that chain of events was not predictable

Apparently you do not believe in cause and effect.

 

[ding]

The universe is just a place where things can happen. We are the result of trillions upon trillions to the trillionth power of random events. We are insignificant compared to the entirety of the universe.

The evolution of space and time has proceeded in a very logical and sequential fashion. Every cause had an effect and every effect had a cause.

Do you or don't you agree?

And some of those causes are random events. Liken it to the throwing of trillions of dice each having multiple sides.

The throwing of the dice is a cause but the result of that known cause is an astronomical number of random conditions. Those random conditions can then become causes of untold more random conditions.

There is no predictable sequence

The evolution of space and time say otherwise. So does the theory of evolution.

You only say that because we came into the movie late.

No one was around to witness the inception of the universe.

We tend to think of time as linear. It very well may not be.

CMB, red shift, FLoT, SLoT, quantum mechanics and GR say otherwise.

And time is relative.

 

[ding]

Looking at it from an human evolutionary perspective we could say prehistoric man's only purpose was to survive and procreate. Since we are primates we can assume we evolved as social creatures. The culmination of that social evolution is what has made us what we are. We are no longer simply a product of the natural environment and we are more a product of our societies than anything else.

Throughout history every society has overwhelmingly held the belief that man is more than just matter and that there is a higher power than man. From the atheist's vantage point these beliefs AND BEHAVIORS exist because of evolutionary forces. But the reality is that even that argument confirms that these beliefs AND BEHAVIORS offer a functional advantage over materialism. According to natural selection there are two main components; functional advantage and transfer of functional advantage to the next generation. So even natural selection confirms that these beliefs AND BEHAVIORS lead to success. Otherwise, according to natural selection, these beliefs AND BEHAVIORS would have been abandoned long ago. As mankind has gained more and more knowledge of his natural surroundings his desire for spirituality has not diminished. In fact, the more materialistic mankind became the less satisfied mankind became. It's all very logical.

Man has always used gods to explain what they didn't comprehend. As we have understood more and more of our environment we have discarded those gods. The belief in some everlasting spirit is nothing but a manifestation of our fear of death and that we will somehow continue to live on after death.

And I'll grant you that religion did have a societal effect as all measures of control do. When the ruling class can get the masses to think that if they behaved than there would be some reward beyond the misery of their existence then you get an obedient populace and that makes the success of a society more likely not to mention that it enriches the powers that be, including the religious orders which gave those institutions even more power.

So we boil it all down to the biggest of our unanswered questions.

How did we get here and what happens after we die.

We don't really know what caused the inception of the universe and we certainly don't understand anything but a fraction of our universe. And we may never understand it. We as sentient creature that fear death like to think that our consciousness (spirit) that makes us the individuals we are won't simply vanish when we die.

Looking at it from an human evolutionary perspective we could say prehistoric man's only purpose was to survive and procreate. Since we are primates we can assume we evolved as social creatures. The culmination of that social evolution is what has made us what we are. We are no longer simply a product of the natural environment and we are more a product of our societies than anything else.

Throughout history every society has overwhelmingly held the belief that man is more than just matter and that there is a higher power than man. From the atheist's vantage point these beliefs AND BEHAVIORS exist because of evolutionary forces. But the reality is that even that argument confirms that these beliefs AND BEHAVIORS offer a functional advantage over materialism. According to natural selection there are two main components; functional advantage and transfer of functional advantage to the next generation. So even natural selection confirms that these beliefs AND BEHAVIORS lead to success. Otherwise, according to natural selection, these beliefs AND BEHAVIORS would have been abandoned long ago. As mankind has gained more and more knowledge of his natural surroundings his desire for spirituality has not diminished. In fact, the more materialistic mankind became the less satisfied mankind became. It's all very logical.

Man has always used gods to explain what they didn't comprehend. As we have understood more and more of our environment we have discarded those gods. The belief in some everlasting spirit is nothing but a manifestation of our fear of death and that we will somehow continue to live on after death.

And I'll grant you that religion did have a societal effect as all measures of control do. When the ruling class can get the masses to think that if they behaved than there would be some reward beyond the misery of their existence then you get an obedient populace and that makes the success of a society more likely not to mention that it enriches the powers that be, including the religious orders which gave those institutions even more power.

So we boil it all down to the biggest of our unanswered questions.

How did we get here and what happens after we die.

We don't really know what caused the inception of the universe and we certainly don't understand anything but a fraction of our universe. And we may never understand it. We as sentient creature that fear death like to think that our consciousness (spirit) that makes us the individuals we are won't simply vanish when we die. So we will continue to speculate the existence of creators and afterlives until we can actually understand them. And since I believe we may be incapable of understanding them due to the physical limitations of our brains then we will always speculate about the mystical as a cause for the physical world we do not understand

And yet natural selection confirms that belief in God is functionally superior to materialism.

No it doesn't.

Of course natural selection confirms that spirituality offers a functional advantage to materialism. If it didn't everyone would be atheist.

 

[Blues Man]

If the universe has a purpose then I must have a purpose. If the universe has no purpose then I must have no purpose.

The definition of purpose is the reason for which something is done or created or for which something exists. If a constant presence of mind intentionally created the universe, then it was created for a purpose. If the universe was not created by a constant presence of mind then it would have not been intentionally created and it is just matter and energy doing what matter and energy do.

Do you agree?

So you think that your purpose is defined by something outside yourself?

You are operating on a big if and instead of regarding that if as a hypothetical you are operating as if that if then hypothetical condition is proven fact.

Purpose is not defined by the creator of anything. It is defined by the user.

The inventor of a wrench can try to tell me that the purpose of the wrench is to apply torque to a particular size nut. But if I use that wrench to strike a person in self defense I have defined the purpose of the wrench in that instant to be a weapon.

So purpose is subjective and defined by the person using a tool not the person who created the tool.

And I see nothing contradictory in believing the universe was not created for a purpose. The universe simply is what it is.

Purpose is defined by what something was made for. We were made to know and to create.

A hammer was made to hammer. A lawn mower was made to cut grass. The universe was made to create intelligence.

No purpose is defined by the intent of user.
I can use a knife to cut food, chop wood or stab a person. I decide the purpose of that knife.
If I use a lawn mower to kill a person than I defined that lawn mowers purpose in that instance.


And we do not how how the universe came to be so for a human being being so insignificant to claim he knows the purpose of the universe is outrageously arrogant and not to mention conceited.

As I said we humans have a penchant for grandiose thinking and we think so much of ourselves that we like to think we are the very image of a god and that the universe was made just for us.

I hate to burst your bubble but we are an insignificant life form in one galaxy among a couple trillion galaxies.

The purpose of a lawn mower is to cut grass no matter how many people you kill with it.

The purpose of a knife is to cut.

There is nothing special about humans. Being the pinnacle of creation means we are the most complex thing the universe has produced. The universe is an intelligence creating machine. Intelligence is written into the laws of nature and the fabric of existence.

I disagree.

If I use a wrench to pound a nail into a piece of wood I have defined the purpose of that wrench in that instant as a tool to pound a nail it doesn't matter to the wrench what its inventor designed it for and it certainly doesn't matter to me, the user of the tool. It is the intent of the person using a tool that defines its purpose and that purpose can change.

The universe isn't a machine.

 

[Blues Man]

Looking at it from an human evolutionary perspective we could say prehistoric man's only purpose was to survive and procreate. Since we are primates we can assume we evolved as social creatures. The culmination of that social evolution is what has made us what we are. We are no longer simply a product of the natural environment and we are more a product of our societies than anything else.

Throughout history every society has overwhelmingly held the belief that man is more than just matter and that there is a higher power than man. From the atheist's vantage point these beliefs AND BEHAVIORS exist because of evolutionary forces. But the reality is that even that argument confirms that these beliefs AND BEHAVIORS offer a functional advantage over materialism. According to natural selection there are two main components; functional advantage and transfer of functional advantage to the next generation. So even natural selection confirms that these beliefs AND BEHAVIORS lead to success. Otherwise, according to natural selection, these beliefs AND BEHAVIORS would have been abandoned long ago. As mankind has gained more and more knowledge of his natural surroundings his desire for spirituality has not diminished. In fact, the more materialistic mankind became the less satisfied mankind became. It's all very logical.

Man has always used gods to explain what they didn't comprehend. As we have understood more and more of our environment we have discarded those gods. The belief in some everlasting spirit is nothing but a manifestation of our fear of death and that we will somehow continue to live on after death.

And I'll grant you that religion did have a societal effect as all measures of control do. When the ruling class can get the masses to think that if they behaved than there would be some reward beyond the misery of their existence then you get an obedient populace and that makes the success of a society more likely not to mention that it enriches the powers that be, including the religious orders which gave those institutions even more power.

So we boil it all down to the biggest of our unanswered questions.

How did we get here and what happens after we die.

We don't really know what caused the inception of the universe and we certainly don't understand anything but a fraction of our universe. And we may never understand it. We as sentient creature that fear death like to think that our consciousness (spirit) that makes us the individuals we are won't simply vanish when we die.

Looking at it from an human evolutionary perspective we could say prehistoric man's only purpose was to survive and procreate. Since we are primates we can assume we evolved as social creatures. The culmination of that social evolution is what has made us what we are. We are no longer simply a product of the natural environment and we are more a product of our societies than anything else.

Throughout history every society has overwhelmingly held the belief that man is more than just matter and that there is a higher power than man. From the atheist's vantage point these beliefs AND BEHAVIORS exist because of evolutionary forces. But the reality is that even that argument confirms that these beliefs AND BEHAVIORS offer a functional advantage over materialism. According to natural selection there are two main components; functional advantage and transfer of functional advantage to the next generation. So even natural selection confirms that these beliefs AND BEHAVIORS lead to success. Otherwise, according to natural selection, these beliefs AND BEHAVIORS would have been abandoned long ago. As mankind has gained more and more knowledge of his natural surroundings his desire for spirituality has not diminished. In fact, the more materialistic mankind became the less satisfied mankind became. It's all very logical.

Man has always used gods to explain what they didn't comprehend. As we have understood more and more of our environment we have discarded those gods. The belief in some everlasting spirit is nothing but a manifestation of our fear of death and that we will somehow continue to live on after death.

And I'll grant you that religion did have a societal effect as all measures of control do. When the ruling class can get the masses to think that if they behaved than there would be some reward beyond the misery of their existence then you get an obedient populace and that makes the success of a society more likely not to mention that it enriches the powers that be, including the religious orders which gave those institutions even more power.

So we boil it all down to the biggest of our unanswered questions.

How did we get here and what happens after we die.

We don't really know what caused the inception of the universe and we certainly don't understand anything but a fraction of our universe. And we may never understand it. We as sentient creature that fear death like to think that our consciousness (spirit) that makes us the individuals we are won't simply vanish when we die. So we will continue to speculate the existence of creators and afterlives until we can actually understand them. And since I believe we may be incapable of understanding them due to the physical limitations of our brains then we will always speculate about the mystical as a cause for the physical world we do not understand

And yet natural selection confirms that belief in God is functionally superior to materialism.

No it doesn't.

Of course natural selection confirms that spirituality offers a functional advantage to materialism. If it didn't everyone would be atheist.

If that were true then food, air and water would be less important than spirituality. The material is far more important because without there would be no man made concept of the spirit

 

[Blues Man]

The universe is just a place where things can happen. We are the result of trillions upon trillions to the trillionth power of random events. We are insignificant compared to the entirety of the universe.

The evolution of space and time has proceeded in a very logical and sequential fashion. Every cause had an effect and every effect had a cause.

Do you or don't you agree?

And some of those causes are random events. Liken it to the throwing of trillions of dice each having multiple sides.

The throwing of the dice is a cause but the result of that known cause is an astronomical number of random conditions. Those random conditions can then become causes of untold more random conditions.

There is no predictable sequence

The evolution of space and time say otherwise. So does the theory of evolution.

You only say that because we came into the movie late.

No one was around to witness the inception of the universe.

We tend to think of time as linear. It very well may not be.

CMB, red shift, FLoT, SLoT, quantum mechanics and GR say otherwise.

And time is relative.

Once again we are coming into the theater after the movie started.

And we have yet to have a unified field theory that can reconcile all the forces into a coherent whole.

We are 3 dimensional beings living in an at least a 4 dimensional reality. We cannot perceive any dimension beyond the third. So we do not know if time is linear or not we just assume it is.

 

[Meriweather]

Human used gods as explanations for what they did not understand.

How many gods have been discarded by humans over the eons? We used them to explain just about everything from birth to thunderstorms.

Now we use a god to explain the inception of the universe

What difference does it make to one's life today as to how the universe came into existence? Not.A.Bit. Did intelligence come from matter? Did matter come from intelligence? Are both eternal/infinite? God's relationship to the universe and its beginnings has nothing to do with one's own life and relationships.

Even if in the next hour someone proves a great intelligence (God) is how the universe began, the next argument would begin. "Just because God created the universe doesn't mean He particularly cares about human life..."

 

[ding]

If the universe has a purpose then I must have a purpose. If the universe has no purpose then I must have no purpose.

The definition of purpose is the reason for which something is done or created or for which something exists. If a constant presence of mind intentionally created the universe, then it was created for a purpose. If the universe was not created by a constant presence of mind then it would have not been intentionally created and it is just matter and energy doing what matter and energy do.

Do you agree?

So you think that your purpose is defined by something outside yourself?

You are operating on a big if and instead of regarding that if as a hypothetical you are operating as if that if then hypothetical condition is proven fact.

Purpose is not defined by the creator of anything. It is defined by the user.

The inventor of a wrench can try to tell me that the purpose of the wrench is to apply torque to a particular size nut. But if I use that wrench to strike a person in self defense I have defined the purpose of the wrench in that instant to be a weapon.

So purpose is subjective and defined by the person using a tool not the person who created the tool.

And I see nothing contradictory in believing the universe was not created for a purpose. The universe simply is what it is.

Purpose is defined by what something was made for. We were made to know and to create.

A hammer was made to hammer. A lawn mower was made to cut grass. The universe was made to create intelligence.

No purpose is defined by the intent of user.
I can use a knife to cut food, chop wood or stab a person. I decide the purpose of that knife.
If I use a lawn mower to kill a person than I defined that lawn mowers purpose in that instance.


And we do not how how the universe came to be so for a human being being so insignificant to claim he knows the purpose of the universe is outrageously arrogant and not to mention conceited.

As I said we humans have a penchant for grandiose thinking and we think so much of ourselves that we like to think we are the very image of a god and that the universe was made just for us.

I hate to burst your bubble but we are an insignificant life form in one galaxy among a couple trillion galaxies.

The purpose of a lawn mower is to cut grass no matter how many people you kill with it.

The purpose of a knife is to cut.

There is nothing special about humans. Being the pinnacle of creation means we are the most complex thing the universe has produced. The universe is an intelligence creating machine. Intelligence is written into the laws of nature and the fabric of existence.

I disagree.

If I use a wrench to pound a nail into a piece of wood I have defined the purpose of that wrench in that instant as a tool to pound a nail it doesn't matter to the wrench what its inventor designed it for and it certainly doesn't matter to me, the user of the tool. It is the intent of the person using a tool that defines its purpose and that purpose can change.

The universe isn't a machine.

With logic like that you could argue the purpose of a vagina is to hold cement.

 

[ding]

The universe isn't a machine.

Correct it is an complex interconnected adaptive system whose purpose is to create intelligence. Saying the universe is an intelligence creating machine is a metaphor.

 

[ding]

The universe is just a place where things can happen. We are the result of trillions upon trillions to the trillionth power of random events. We are insignificant compared to the entirety of the universe.

The evolution of space and time has proceeded in a very logical and sequential fashion. Every cause had an effect and every effect had a cause.

Do you or don't you agree?

And some of those causes are random events. Liken it to the throwing of trillions of dice each having multiple sides.

The throwing of the dice is a cause but the result of that known cause is an astronomical number of random conditions. Those random conditions can then become causes of untold more random conditions.

There is no predictable sequence

The evolution of space and time say otherwise. So does the theory of evolution.

You only say that because we came into the movie late.

No one was around to witness the inception of the universe.

We tend to think of time as linear. It very well may not be.

CMB, red shift, FLoT, SLoT, quantum mechanics and GR say otherwise.

And time is relative.

Once again we are coming into the theater after the movie started.

And we have yet to have a unified field theory that can reconcile all the forces into a coherent whole.

We are 3 dimensional beings living in an at least a 4 dimensional reality. We cannot perceive any dimension beyond the third. So we do not know if time is linear or not we just assume it is.

Again... CMB, red shift, FLoT, SLoT, quantum mechanics and GR say otherwise.