Ha. I'll leave the content of the stars up to the astrophysicists. The anatomy of stars are no longer theories; they are facts. Although, maybe you should write them a letter about your professional opinion. I'm sure they didn't even think of that!

P.S. Before you ramble on about how they could be wrong again: what are your qualifications?

It is a matter of philosophical technicality, and he was not stating facts- merely suggesting the slight possibility of 'it' not being correct does exist. You should take it up with qualifications and sources when it talks about downright statements.
Also, the action you ask would depend on 'what' professor you ask. If you've got a professor of philosophy who's obsessed with Descarte's work, then he would also doubt whether the star is as they say, let alone the reality he is living in.

We can philosophically pick apart anything until is is no longer a fact, but for fucks sake, can we not?

Much like BeDazed said, the important point here is not that we're talking about stars, but that we're talking about situations in which our knowledge is not complete enough to call something "proven." To continue with the 'stars' example, consider how we obtain our 'knowledge' about these stars. Billion year old light radiated from these stars is measured by wavelength and frequency by telescopes like the Hubble, and compared to light from other stars in order to gain knowledge about the relative mass, frequency, and composition of these stars. Now consider all the ceterus paribus assumptions involved, and in particular, consider only a miniscule modification to one of them, for example, the consistency of the speed of light. It's typically taken to be a universal constant, 186000 miles per second. But our knowledge of the universe is incomplete, and perhaps as time passes it actually decreases, by say, .0000001 miles per second every year. Over the span of human existence, I doubt our technology would be accurate enough to notice it. But if we consider that the speed of light changed over the billion years it took for light from a particular star to reach us, it would have a massive effect on our calculations about the composition of that star. Or imagine that the universe is .000000001% more dense than our calculations show. When you start multiplying things by a billion, even the tiniest change can have a huge effect. Consider the incompleteness of quantum field theory. Maybe, at the centers of these stars reactions unlike anything we've ever seen before take place. The point being, as soon as you actually have some knowledge of what goes on out there, you realize how much knowledge you don't have. It parallels the God debate well.


There's no need for me to write a letter when I can simply speak face to face with them
I happen to know that they have thought of this sort of thing, and actively investigate it.

Also, you might not want to lay the sarcasm on too thick in here. SD's actually supposed to be serious.

Post has been edited 1 time(s), last time on May 23 2010, 3:38 am by Vrael.

No seriously. Maybe you should tell them about this. I'm sure they didn't take the possibility of error into their calculations. You sir, are a genius. Inform astrophysicists everywhere ASAP!!

Anyways. The existence of (a) god is completely unprovable. That's why the stars comparison is not a good one. Even though Vrael has enlightened us that astrophysicists everywhere could be .000000000000000000000000000000001 off of something and not even seen it coming: there is still certain proof about the star's contents. Even if they can not be 100% sure, their evidence could be as low as 10% accurate-- and would still outweigh the evidence (or lack thereof) for the existence of (a) god.

I think you're missing the point, leeroy. It isn't the .000001 in the speed of light calculation that's important, it's the effect on the calculation of the composition of a star that is important. That little .000001 could throw off the calculation about the composition of the star completely, i.e. they think it's made of hydrogen and its actually made of uranium, or a similar vital point.

Likewise, when it comes to our knowlege of god, a lack of knowledge on our part could lead us to believe one thing, when an entirely different situation could be true, i.e. god exists in reality and we believe that he doesn't, or we believe that he exists and in reality he doesn't.

The main point is that it's one thing to have a very very good theory, and wholly another to have proof. Take Newtonian physics for example, for two hundred years everyone believed it to be absolutely correct. BAM Einstein comes along and shoots it down. Blink of and eye and "proven fact" becomes fiction. It's not so far fetched as you seem to believe.

And seriously, stop with the sarcasm. Ad hominem won't get you anywhere, and it's against the rules. Like I said, they already know about this sort of thing, and not just astrophysicists, but any physicist will tell you how important the exponent on the number is.

Post has been edited 1 time(s), last time on May 24 2010, 1:28 am by Vrael.

I am not missing the point, and there was no need to reiterate for the third time. I realize that you believe it could throw off the composition of the star completely. Whether or not this is true is not relevant, and is not what I was arguing in my last post. My argument is that we do have some facts (not necessarily all) about the composition of stars, and I am sure that there are some elements that we can 100% say stars are not made out of.


As I was arguing in my last post, the difference between these two situations is that our lack of knowledge for the existence of god is non-existent, while certain evidence points us in the correct direction when looking at stars. Thus, the two are nothing alike; for the existence of god has absolutely no evidence, whilst the composition of stars has some.

I beg to differ; there is plenty of evidence pointing to God. While I doubt this evidence will change your mind about the existence of God, here it is.

1. Complexity of life. The third law of thermodynamics means that evolution is impossible, yet here we are. Even if evolution was possible, it wouldn't be able to produce such complexity by random chance, especially with increasing entropy.

2. The fact that ANYTHING exists. Technically this isn't evidence, but the universe and the beginning of time has to have come from SOMEWHERE. Logically, it all was created by a being outside of space and time. The only other possible explanations involve the Matrix, and aliens. And they're pretty far-fetched.

There's probably more but that's enough to start.

To avoid reiterating my argument a fourth time then, I'll pose a question. How is it that we can have perfect knowledge of a particular aspect of a given subject/topic/situation (stars, god, ect) when there is some knowledge we do not have which will affect our perfect knowledge of that aspect? As far as I see, we can either say we're not 100% sure, and that it's only very likely, or we can admit that we don't have perfect knowledge about the situation.

To put it without all the analogy and star examples, my counter argument is that you cannot claim something is true when it is only very likely. You would first need to know which case out of all possible cases is the reality, which means you would need complete knowledge about the cases and the reality you're trying to reconcile. There are some assumptions which substitute for complete or near-complete knowedge of the situation, like when you say ice is frictionless or only the Butler or Colonel Mustard could have killed the guy. But when we're talking about something on the scale of the laws of the universe, or of God, it often doesn't make sense to apply many assumptions because they could be drastically wrong, or there's no real basis for us to apply them. When we assume something like ice is frictionless, it's because we deal with materials every day and have lots of experience with them, but what's our basis for assuming something like the interior of a star acts a certain way, when we have no experience with the interior of stars?



Before we even get to the stage of presenting evidence, there remains a lot to be seen about the nature of God himself. We can't, for example, prove that an Oompa Loompa exists if we don't know what an Oompa Loompa is. If God is consistent with the rest of the observable universe, he will have certain attributes, physical or otherwise, that we can examine to establish a framework or list or reference as to whether or not those attributes are compatible with this universe. If God is not consistent with this universe, then he may or may not exist, and nothing we can do, say, or find will ever lead us to him (except perhaps, faith, but that's a different topic under a different meaning). Establishing that God does or does not exist is also much more difficult than establishing that he may or may not exist. For the case "may or may not" exist, all that we need to do prove that his attributes don't contradict with the universe. (lol I make it sound so simple). To establish that he "does or does not" exist, we would need to find some evidence in the universe which intrinsically implies his existence or non-existence. The search leads to a number of interesting questions, like:
Why? Why couldn't the universe have simply always been here. And what experience or knowledge do you have to lead you to the conclusion that it must have come from somewhere?

Post has been edited 1 time(s), last time on May 24 2010, 3:26 am by Vrael.

How has anything related to life been going towards absolute zero? Energy to start life came from the sun. How is that related to absolute zero?
That statement does not sound scientifically correct.

Woops, I meant the second law of thermodynamics

Alright. Clearing things up. There are no material evidence that suggest God(s) exist- neither does the evidence that suggest God doesn't exist. You've clearly thought of second law of thermodynamics in the wrong way. Yes, entropy has a tendency to increase, and material have a tendency to become more 'even'. That doesn't mean you can't decrease entropy. Say for example, a bubble of gas increasing in volume is 'working' toward outside volume to increase its own volume. But in the case of increasing entropy, one must work to decrease entropy. Alas, since work is energy, seemingly enough energy is provided to a half closed system for life to evolve without going against rules of physics. In the end, it proves nothing wrong or right. We already knew this, scientifically.

The logic of Universe having to have to come from somewhere is an invalid logic. There is no reason to see why something had to come from something. If there is our Universe, then outside our Universe- what is there? Does something have to exist beyond our universe? And if something did, does it go on forever- just like that? Or if it didn't, why? There are infinite ways to think of our current state- however, nothing but one is a fact. But there is no way to tell what is and what isn't currently. Thus, it is more logical to decide on nothing. However, believing in something was always possible.

A few examples that overlooks the possible state on the top of my head. The list may go on forever, but who would want to read that. It would be better to just read a good sci-fi.
God really existed. And he did create this Universe.
The Universe existed, but in a loop of contraction into a singularity, then expanding back into a universe. And the Universe was just there, at least in our point of view.
A bigger universe existed. A chunk of singularity in that universe mysteriously popped to form another bubble of space, separating that Universe from this.

I don't think that was the point.

This argument doesn't belong in this topic anyway, since it doesn't arrive at any sort of implication about God. God could exist if evolution is true or if evolution is not true, and God could not exist in both cases also.

I saw this post, and had to say something.

1. So, your saying that because life is complex, that there MUST be a God, else how could this exist?
Now, I have to say this: How would this God have the skill, knowledge and power to create such a complex entity.

2. Who's to say that the concept of reality as we know it exists in the form that we believe that it does?
And if there is a "Matrix", or aliens, as you say, then who is to say the creators/aliens concept of reality exists as they believe it does, and that they're not in the same "Matrix/Alien" situation? It could be a near-infinite series of Matrix/Alien combinations.

Now, I'm not trying to convince you God isn't real. I'm not trying to convince you that God is real, either.
I'm just simply pointing out problems in the argument you posted.

My definition of a God is an omnipotent, omniscient being. Make complex things would be easy for God.

As to the matrix/aliens theories, they are indeed problematic and far-fetched. I merely included them to show that there ARE other possibilities other than God.

The original debate by itself is near impossible to prove either way. This question is even more ridiculous. We can not check his references, so at this point we'd be pulling shit out of our ass.

How is the question ridiculous?

How does your brain have the ability to write?

Exactly.

It is not exactly. Then the question is no doubt, pointless to ask. It is not an appropriate question to be answered by any of us. That is why it is ridiculous.