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#14794014
One idea is that Christianity and Christian behaviors are capable of being distinct from each other, but that you are unlikely to appreciate or figure out Christian behaviors on your own. Therefore, you don't have to be a Christian to be saved but the world still needs Christianity.

Ultimately though, no religion can have a commanding influence without supporting traditions that contextualize it and settle semantic issues. Western Christianity has lost this whereas there are other religions that have not. This is why the scientism of Christianity, such as arguments about creationism and DNA and so-on, has become so prominent even among people in America who have retained their religion.
#14794032
Hindsite wrote:I see that the 99% extinction rate of all species is just a guess based on their guess as to how long they guess that an average species can exist and how many species they guess would have came about over 4.5 billion years. However, the 4.5 billion years is basically only a guess too. So, I cannot take that 99% figure seriously.

Seen many diplodocus roaming recently? Or saber-toothed tigers, or maybe a fly by of the odd pterodactyl?
#14794038
Then you are probably as frustrated as I am that Christians (nowadays) spend so much time arguing about this, for you because you are a believer and for me because, after one or two trips around the block, it's rather dull and predictable.


I am very frustrated about it. If we Christians spent half as much time showing scientists how loving, kind and compassionate we are as we do trying to convince them that man and dinosaurs lived together there would be a hell of a lot more Christian scientists.

But here is the really cool thing. I'm going to tell a Christian secret. It is so secret that most Christians do not even know it so no re-posting. Here it is:

We don't have to convince scientists that the world is 6000 years old. We don't even have to convince them that there is a physical God out there somewhere. All we have to do is convince them that the ought to "love your neighbor as yourself" and it is Christ for the win! Right? We do this by showing them how cool it is to do this stuff. And how rewarding. How effective in solving so many of our problems. This alone, if we are to believe the verse about "even though you did it to the least of these my brothers, you did it to me" then we have not only gotten them to obey Christs greatest commandment, we have also copped for them eternal life. And they didn't even know it. The smug "you're welcome" can wait. (You don't have to be a denominational Christian to get into heaven. I think we have already established that.)

Christ did not come to recruit Christians. He came to save souls. I am not called to make people Methodists or Catholics but rather to show them how to grab eternal life in God's love and in their lives show God's love to others.

So if by living an moderately good Christian life and showing them the joy it can give I happen to get some of them to want to join us wearing the label of Christian then all the much better. They can inspire others.

One idea is that Christianity and Christian behaviors are capable of being distinct from each other, but that you are unlikely to appreciate or figure out Christian behaviors on your own. Therefore, you don't have to be a Christian to be saved but the world still needs Christianity.


All to true.

Ultimately though, no religion can have a commanding influence without supporting traditions that contextualize it and settle semantic issues. Western Christianity has lost this whereas there are other religions that have not. This is why the scientism of Christianity, such as arguments about creationism and DNA and so-on, has become so prominent even among people in America who have retained their religion.


Christianity hasn't lost this. There are just a few really loud voices making it hard to see the truth over the bullshit. But I believe that Christians are changing for the better. I would rather see fewer (but very effective Christians) than millions of Christians in name only. (As I once was.)

The message can and will get out. We just have to stop the loudmouth, pseudo intellectual clowns from harshing our buzz and the word will get out.

By the way Hindsite. Nice quote from Romans. Do come back when you have a clue what that verse actually means. Try to find out what the therefor's are therefor.
#14794041
Potemkin wrote:And if you mean that time might have 'stretched out' as we go backwards towards the Big Bang, then my reply would be that this cannot be the case, otherwise the first 'instant' after the Big Bang would still be happening, and it clearly isn't.


I would disgree with this. The fact spacetime (and ultimately the universe) is expanding can only mean that 'The Big Bang' is still occuring and as time is relative I would even suggest this means the first instants of the big bang too (but obviously not in our timeframe so it's not possible to observe). I won't go into the semantics here (and my idea is only opinion based anyway), but I will be doing a thread on time soon and it's best to keep this thread to it's OP origins I suppose.
#14794072
In an attempt to prevent this thread from constantly deviating for the original topic, I have decide to start another thread on Creation in 6 days or Evolution over billions of years.
#14794079
Hindsite wrote:In an attempt to prevent this thread from constantly deviating for the original topic, I have decide to start another thread on Creation in 6 days or Evolution over billions of years.


Good move, it seems you haven't started it yet so in the meantime I will go looking for a half-remembered video where some Jewish guy posits that these can be the same thing and goes on to explain why. We've already considered time dilation, so maybe that's the first step...

Found the thread. Hopefully there will be less Creation/Evolution talk in this thread from now on
Last edited by jakell on 06 Apr 2017 12:01, edited 1 time in total.
#14794088
'The Big Bang' is still occuring and as time is relative I would even suggest this means the first instants of the big bang too (but obviously not in our timeframe so it's not possible to observe).

If time is relative and it's not still happening in our time frame, then it's not still happening for us. To say that it's still happening in some other time frame (whose?) is metaphysics, not physics. See how that works, B0ycey? ;)

And the statement that "time is relative" is not strictly correct. Even in relativity theory, there is such a thing as the 'absolute time', which is the time which has elapsed in a given frame of reference, regardless of what other observers in other frames of reference may measure. When a spaceship is travelling at close to the speed of light, then the elapsed time on that spaceship is measured as elapsing at a slower rate by an observer who is at rest relative to the spaceship. But from the viewpoint of the crew of that spaceship, time moves at the normal rate. Why wouldn't it? Saying that time actually slows down on the spaceship is like saying that an object far away from us is smaller than the same object close by us. No it isn't; it's just far away.



:excited:
#14794114
Hindsite wrote:In an attempt to prevent this thread from constantly deviating for the original topic, I have decide to start another thread on Creation in 6 days or Evolution over billions of years.

Where can it be found?
#14794142
[quote="Drlee"]
But here is the really cool thing. I'm going to tell a Christian secret. It is so secret that most Christians do not even know it so no re-posting. Here it is:

We don't have to convince scientists that the world is 6000 years old. We don't even have to convince them that there is a physical God out there somewhere. All we have to do is convince them that the ought to "love your neighbor as yourself" and it is Christ for the win! Right?

You couldn't convince scientist in 13.8 BILLION years that the world is 6000 years sold.

You don't need to convince them there Is a 'god' out there somewhere...there isn't & they already know it.

"All we have to do is convince them that the ought to "love your neighbor as yourself" and it is Christ for the win! Right"?

Erm! NO, Just why bible thumpers believe that how neighbours live in harmony is some ' Christian' inspired message is beyond understanding.

It's NOTHING top do with 'religion', it's a simple fact that it's best that we do so, as it preserves a more peaceful & respectful way of life.

The trouble with all religions is, they preach al the virtues one day a week & practice all the vices the other six days.


'Religious' people should practice what they preach 7 days a week, just to prove to themselves that they are not doing the, "don't do as I do, do as I say" hypocrisy.

The attitudes of 'religious' folk, are the same as 'political' folk, the objective is solely the use of mind power to brainwash & control other people as the state does.
The state uses the law to preserve it's use of power to control the populace, 'religion' uses it's own version of the law to exercise the control over 'believers', the adherence to whatever each 'faith' decides is the best tool to control the flock of sheep it has power over, usually, the 'bible', the Quran, or whatever.

Christianity is as hollow as all other religions or politics, only gullible people have 'faith' or 'believe'.

No matter what people follow, there's always a 'rainbow' at the end of the trail they are heading towards, it's presence is identified by money laden 'leaders' that control them through the money these 'believers' donate to these mind controllers.

'Religion' is an activity that has wasted an immeasurable amount of time & people's lives.

It's the most useless of activities that one could ever devise, watching paint dry is more rewarding.
#14794145
Potemkin wrote:If time is relative and it's not still happening in our time frame, then it's not still happening for us. To say that it's still happening in some other time frame (whose?) is metaphysics, not physics. See how that works, B0ycey? ;)


Now we've got the thread pointing back towards spiritual matters (and metaphysics), we could postulate that the other frame of reference might be God's (or Jesus etc)

And the statement that "time is relative" is not strictly correct. Even in relativity theory, there is such a thing as the 'absolute time', which is the time which has elapsed in a given frame of reference, regardless of what other observers in other frames of reference may measure. When a spaceship is travelling at close to the speed of light, then the elapsed time on that spaceship is measured as elapsing at a slower rate by an observer who is at rest relative to the spaceship. But from the viewpoint of the crew of that spaceship, time moves at the normal rate. Why wouldn't it? Saying that time actually slows down on the spaceship is like saying that an object far away from us is smaller than the same object close by us. No it isn't; it's just far away.



:excited:


This is the first Father Ted video that I've seen get past Youtube copyright filter in a long time.
#14794177
To put it another way, time is "relative" in the current physics definition of the term relative, which I believe is different from the vernacular definition of the term relative. I imagine that most people who like to say things like "time is relative, man" don't understand this.
#14794183
'Religious' people should practice what they preach 7 days a week, just to prove to themselves that they are not doing the, "don't do as I do, do as I say" hypocrisy.

The attitudes of 'religious' folk, are the same as 'political' folk, the objective is solely the use of mind power to brainwash & control other people as the state does.
The state uses the law to preserve it's use of power to control the populace, 'religion' uses it's own version of the law to exercise the control over 'believers', the adherence to whatever each 'faith' decides is the best tool to control the flock of sheep it has power over, usually, the 'bible', the Quran, or whatever.

Christianity is as hollow as all other religions or politics, only gullible people have 'faith' or 'believe'.

No matter what people follow, there's always a 'rainbow' at the end of the trail they are heading towards, it's presence is identified by money laden 'leaders' that control them through the money these 'believers' donate to these mind controllers.

'Religion' is an activity that has wasted an immeasurable amount of time & people's lives.

It's the most useless of activities that one could ever devise, watching paint dry is more rewarding.



Yawn.

Come back when you are an adult and have something useful to say.
#14794742
Potemkin wrote:
And the statement that "time is relative" is not strictly correct. Even in relativity theory, there is such a thing as the 'absolute time', which is the time which has elapsed in a given frame of reference, regardless of what other observers in other frames of reference may measure. When a spaceship is travelling at close to the speed of light, then the elapsed time on that spaceship is measured as elapsing at a slower rate by an observer who is at rest relative to the spaceship. But from the viewpoint of the crew of that spaceship, time moves at the normal rate. Why wouldn't it? Saying that time actually slows down on the spaceship is like saying that an object far away from us is smaller than the same object close by us. No it isn't; it's just far away.


Time is relative because depending on our speed we can slow or speed it up. How we experience time is another matter. I am spending quite a bit of time on the mathematics on hubbles constant and Einstein's relativity theories at the moment and the irony is perception mathematics is key to my thinking about time too. So sure, use that to emphasis your point, because I think perception is key to figuring out time actually. Perhaps you should visit my other two threads on the 'speed of light' and 'our mind being a matrix' and make your opinions known there. I can only be constructive in my thinking if I have someone make genuine comments that I haven't thought of to make my thinking more absolute. I genuinely believe (but this is only my opinion), time, or to put it another way, how our minds perceive time, is all due to our minds registering light and putting it into something we understand and can create a reality from. As for time itself, I think it works very similar to a balloon. Old time (the observable beginnings of our universe) is at the edge of the universe and the speed of light is faster than how we consider it to be there (in my opinion and not scientific opinion), and new time is at the centre of the universe and is expanding very slow (and the speed of light is slower there too) so we are unable to observe our future due to this. And my thinking is it's similar to a balloon because when you tie a balloon up, the closer to the knot, the less the plastic has expanded. As for time, it would work similar to animation. For example, movement is due to the object moving to one time period to another. So we consider it as movement, but in reality it has just changed time periods. And I don't know if anything I have wrote makes any sense, but one day I will do a thread about time and you can make your view known there when I hope to be more clearer than I am now on my thinking.
#14794807
Time is relative because depending on our speed we can slow or speed it up.

No we can't. The slowing down of time on a spaceship moving at close to the speed of light is a matter of perspective, and depends on relative motion. And furthermore, it is reciprocal. After all, from the perspective of the crew of the moving spaceship, it is the Earth which is moving away from them at close to the speed of light, and they would measure the rate of the passage of time on Earth to be slowed relative to the rate of passage of time on their spaceship. Remember what Father Ted said about the cows not actually being smaller, but just far away? Well, the same logic applies to time dilation in relativity theory. It is reciprocal, and is merely an artefact of perspective. In no real sense has the passage of time actually slowed down anywhere at all. The cow isn't actually small, it's just far away. Lol.

How we experience time is another matter. I am spending quite a bit of time on the mathematics on hubbles constant and Einstein's relativity theories at the moment and the irony is perception mathematics is key to my thinking about time too. So sure, use that to emphasis your point, because I think perception is key to figuring out time actually.

Scientifically speaking, no it isn't. In science, time only has meaning in relation to measurement, not some nebulous notion of "perception". Henri Bergson dealt with our perception of time, but he was a philosopher and not a scientist. Einstein's theory of relativity deals with how we measure time, not how we perceive it. The distinction is a subtle but important one.

Perhaps you should visit my other two threads on the 'speed of light' and 'our mind being a matrix' and make your opinions known there. I can only be constructive in my thinking if I have someone make genuine comments that I haven't thought of to make my thinking more absolute. I genuinely believe (but this is only my opinion), time, or to put it another way, how our minds perceive time, is all due to our minds registering light and putting it into something we understand and can create a reality from.

What do you mean by the word "perceive"? Einstein's famous "thought-experiments" concerning relativity theory involve imagining beams of light, mirrors and clocks in order to measure the passage of time. "Perception" is far too vague and nebulous a concept on which to base a coherent scientific thought-experiment.

As for time itself, I think it works very similar to a balloon. Old time (the observable beginnings of our universe) is at the edge of the universe and the speed of light is faster than how we consider it to be there (in my opinion and not scientific opinion), and new time is at the centre of the universe and is expanding very slow (and the speed of light is slower there too) so we are unable to observe our future due to this. And my thinking is it's similar to a balloon because when you tie a balloon up, the closer to the knot, the less the plastic has expanded.

A moving object changes its spatial location and its temporal location. This is how we know that it is moving. Speed is, after all, distance travelled per unit time. It is moving through space and time. Both movements are necessary in order for it to be possible for us to speak of the object "moving" at all. So I'm not sure what your idea adds to our understanding of the concept of movement, if anything.
#14794825
Time is relative and saying otherwise goes against science. All you have written is another way to say time is relative. Is it worth arguing when we agree just because I dared to challenge you that the big bang is still occuring? As for everything else, as I said, I am working on the maths. Perhaps I am right. Perhaps I'm wrong. But the maths does add up. And I believe perception is the key to understanding time. But I never said that science will back me up. Why would it? It considers the speed of light a constant. But if I am right, it would answer many unanswered questions such as dark matter, solve the spectral index problem and allow the conditions of inflation to be possible. But on this wait until I write my thread when I am more clearer on my understanding. As for the point you really want to debate (why else discuss something I never even mentioned), why I consider the Big bang is still occuring. Because time is relative, if you went into a spaceship that went 'the speed of light' (not close to, but the speed of light), time in your ship would halt and the perception of time would cease. You could travel to anywhere in the universe and witness it as you see it at the time as you went into light speed. And if my idea was right and new time was being created at the centre of the universe, then you could also witness the birth of the universe if you travelled there. That is why I said not in our timeline. Because I believe our universe is not expanding at the same rate every where. And that is why I used the balloon as an example. But perhaps I'm not clear yet. I never said what I have written was easy to understand.
#14794832
Because time is relative, if you went into a spaceship that went 'the speed of light' (not close to, but the speed of light), time in your ship would halt and the perception of time would cease. You could travel to anywhere in the universe and witness it as you see it at the time as you went into light speed.

Uh, no actually. No object with non-zero mass (which means no physical, material object) can travel at the speed of light. As the relative speed of an object approaches light speed, an observer at rest would measure its mass to increase asymptotically, tending towards infinity as its speed approached the speed of light. If it ever reached the speed of light (which it can't), its inertial mass would be infinite. And since inertial mass is simply resistance to acceleration, the spaceship would require an infinite amount of energy to actually reach the speed of light. It ain't gonna happen. This means that as soon as you postulate that there is a material object moving at the speed of light, your argument is already nonsensical. It's like saying, "If 2+3=7, then what is 5+4?" It's a meaningless question, because its premise is a logical impossibility.
#14794834
Potemkin wrote:Uh, no actually. No object with non-zero mass (which means no physical, material object) can travel at the speed of light. As the relative speed of an object approaches light speed, an observer at rest would measure its mass to increase asymptotically, tending towards infinity as its speed approached the speed of light. If it ever reached the speed of light (which it can't), its inertial mass would be infinite. And since inertial mass is simply resistance to acceleration, the spaceship would require an infinite amount of energy to actually reach the speed of light. It ain't gonna happen. This means that as soon as you postulate that there is a material object moving at the speed of light, your argument is already nonsensical. It's like saying, "If 2+3=7, then what is 5+4?" It's a meaningless question, because its premise is a logical impossibility.


I never said it was possible. I just said if you did. This was my point before actually. If you dare to challenge your opinion, you come from another angle and try and say something you never actually said. And this proves my point. Did I say matter could go at the speed of light? To he honest Pote, I'll leave the science stuff to other people I know and keep this forum to politics. There is too much arrogance on here to have a meaningful discussion on something I am passionate about.
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