General Discussion

Originally posted by Finwe

 

Originally posted by Gameloading

Originally posted by Finwe

Newton may have found interest in alchemy, but lest we forget alchemy was a science with supernatural beliefs. It did not just include the supernatural, but chemistry(which at one point was referred to as alchemy), metallurgy, physics, and so on.

Newton being a scientist, why wouldn't he have found this interesting and worth dabbling in?

As in claiming that because of the time he had no other alternative but to believe, is bull. The man was not a sheep just following the herd because it was convenient. He had a very strong and firm belief in Christianity, it was more apart of him than his science, he was a true man of faith.

Another brilliant scientist who was a believer was Nikola Tesla. The man might as well have invented electricity in concerns to his vast understanding of it and his ability to harness it for the modern world. He was brilliant, modern, and still believed in God.

Just because one intelligent man is an unbeliever, does not mean that all intelligent men are.

It's far from "bull". In that time "god did it" was the most used explenation, and it's much harder to convince yourself that it's not true when there is no alternative.

 

You did nothing to prove anything in argument of my statement, all you did was repeat what was already said, "It was popular, so therefor he must have believed."

Newsflash, atheism has existed as long as faith has. Darwin did not create atheism, he created evolution. And here's another nugget of information, during einsteins life, Christianity was still in it's prime. 1879 to 1955. Are you going to tell me that "God did it" was still not the most used explanation?

Newton was a brilliant man, he saw things other's did not. If he saw a lacking of existance of God, he would have stated as such. Instead the man spent his life dedicated to science, but firstly religious learning. To try to state he believed out of convenience, is of the utmost ignorance.

Nor did you prove anything to try to dispute it.  Religion was the dominating explanation at the time, and in a sense a somewhat logical since there was no evolution alternative. I very much doubt that Isaac Newton was ever introduced to an alternative. It's not strange to see a designer in life when you don't understand natural selection and evolution.

Originally posted by Finwe

 

 

You did nothing to prove anything in argument of my statement, all you did was repeat what was already said, "It was popular, so therefor he must have believed."

Newsflash, atheism has existed as long as faith has. Darwin did not create atheism, he created evolution. And here's another nugget of information, during einsteins life, Christianity was still in it's prime. 1879 to 1955. Are you going to tell me that "God did it" was still not the most used explanation?

Newton was a brilliant man, he saw things other's did not. If he saw a lacking of existance of God, he would have stated as such. Instead the man spent his life dedicated to science, but firstly religious learning. To try to state he believed out of convenience, is of the utmost ignorance.

Christianity's prime was from 1879 to 1955???  Hmmm...I would have guessed more like the 1300's when the Church had vast power over people, governments, etc. 

There are endless things we can all question...We refer to God as:

An Eternal, all powerful existence who can create anything from nothing. In Christianity the Bible(?) states that it took God 7 days to create the Earth, I mean did God create the endless stars of the universe as a hobby before God decided to created the Earth?

Another question would be, we all know that earth has existed for a heck of a lot of years thanks to fossils, and the area of genetics has been developed a lot. If monkeys mutated into humans who have an interect far superior to animals how come I don't have a dog teaching me computing at college?

I personally am happy following my faith because I personally believe that how limited the science , created by man is compared to how perfect nature is on this planet. How the carbon cycle and the nitrogen cycle occurs. How the Earth is in the exact position for existence.

Originally posted by Zindaihas

 

Originally posted by gnomexxx

I don't get what you're saying.  I would expect Einstein to be a bit more open minded about religious doubt.  He came years later than Newton.  Newton was around while the world was somewhere in between the Enlightenment and still burning witches.  It was a different time.

Newton also practiced alchemy.  Something to think about.

So he came from a different time,so what?  In the time since Newton's life, science has come no closer to either proving or disproving the existence of God.  Times may change but truth does not.  The fact that there were people who burned witches in the Middle Ages does nothing to prove or disprove God's existence either, it just shows that people tended to be more superstitious back then.  Actually, people are still plenty superstitious today, it simply manifests itself in different ways.

 

Alchemy dealt with the practice of trying to transform ordinary metals into precious metals, so I don't know what the point of that statement is.  Other than the fact that we now know that it's not possible.

Zindaihas, I'm not going to say this to be mean, so don't read it that way.  It's just that I think you should go back and seriously critique what you wrote on your own.  I bet you're a pretty smart guy who can find the errors in what you wrote by yourself.

Originally posted by Finwe

Newton may have found interest in alchemy, but lest we forget alchemy was a science with supernatural beliefs. It did not just include the supernatural, but chemistry(which at one point was referred to as alchemy), metallurgy, physics, and so on.

Newton being a scientist, why wouldn't he have found this interesting and worth dabbling in?

As in claiming that because of the time he had no other alternative but to believe, is bull. The man was not a sheep just following the herd because it was convenient. He had a very strong and firm belief in Christianity, it was more apart of him than his science, he was a true man of faith.

Another brilliant scientist who was a believer was Nikola Tesla. The man might as well have invented electricity in concerns to his vast understanding of it and his ability to harness it for the modern world. He was brilliant, modern, and still believed in God.

Just because one intelligent man is an unbeliever, does not mean that all intelligent men are.

What you wrote just lends credibility to what I said.  I did say that Newton came from a different time.  The argument I was trying to give a rebuttal to was that Newton and Einstein should be given the same credibility about religious dogma regardless of what period of history they were alive in. 

That's about as silly as saying you should give the same scientific validity to an ancient scientist as one alive today!!!  Experience means something.  And we've gained a lot of it through man's existence here on this planet.  I wouldn't go to a surgeon from the 16th century over a surgeon trained in today's medicine, the same way I wouldn't rest my complete credibility on Newton's ideas (or Einsteins for that matter).

It was Newton who said that all his achievements came from being on the shoulder's of giants.  But at the same time, I know Newton would even say that as time passes we improve upon our recent ideas.  If that's not the case, then why even try to advance new ideas at all?????

Originally posted by Finwe

 

Originally posted by Skoll

 

Originally posted by Finwe

 

 

You did nothing to prove anything in argument of my statement, all you did was repeat what was already said, "It was popular, so therefor he must have believed."

Newsflash, atheism has existed as long as faith has. Darwin did not create atheism, he created evolution. And here's another nugget of information, during einsteins life, Christianity was still in it's prime. 1879 to 1955. Are you going to tell me that "God did it" was still not the most used explanation?

Newton was a brilliant man, he saw things other's did not. If he saw a lacking of existance of God, he would have stated as such. Instead the man spent his life dedicated to science, but firstly religious learning. To try to state he believed out of convenience, is of the utmost ignorance.

 

Unless he didn't have a death wish. I cannot pretend i know him personally but i doubt he was suicidal.

 

The man was not afraid of rocking the boat, he wrote a book with it's thesis on rejecting the trinity(Something hardly popular with the Catholic church).

This was not the inquisition, one did not need to be of a pretensive nature to live. He lived throughout the Age of Enlightenment for God's sake, not the Spanish inquisition.

How forbidden a thought that a brilliant man was also a man of faith...

Yes, Newton was too afraid of rocking the boat.  He had to be completely prodded into releasing his ideas by a fellow friend and scientist.  If it weren't for people urging him to release his findings, we may not even know who Newton was!!!  He was an absolute insecure introvert.  He never even got up the nerve to have a real girlfriend in his life.  Some speculate that he had a form of autism even.

Originally posted by Blurr

I'm just sick of all these people who can't make a point or argument for themselves, and thus have to say things like "Well Einstein said this about religion" or "Lindsay Lohan said this about politics" to make it out like they're right. Just because someone's good at one thing doesn't mean they're right about everything they say.

Many people say Thomas Jefferson is one of the most important figures in the US history, and his opinions on the US way of life stand in many places today, does that mean we should also follow his opinion on slavery? You know who else is famous? Tom Cruise, lets ask his opinion on religion, right?

These types of arguments are absolutely ludicrous. You find some random famous person and then, if their opinion matches yours, you tout them as an expert on the subject. This is bullcrap. Case in point, someone brought up Sir Isaac Newton. Arguably just as influential on science as Einstein was, he had a very strong faith in God. Yet someone tries to dismiss his opinion because it doesn't match with what they want. Do you not see how retarded and circular these arguments are?

"My famous person says there's no God"
"My famous person says there is"
"Your famous person practiced alchemy so his opinion isn't valid"
"Yeah well your famous person had frizzy hair, so his opinion isn't valid"
"Well this other famous person has one eye bigger than the other, and he says there isn't a God"
"Your famous person has the wrong eye that's bigger, that means they're wrong"

Do I need to keep going? Get your own damn opinions people. Stop relying on people you deify to give your opinion to you. This is the same stupid reason why everyone's so obsessed with Paris Hilton and Tom Cruise and Britney Spears, and so forth. You act like they're somehow better than you, that their opinion matters more than yours because they're famous. Get a reality check please.

We as a human race advance in many ways, including our thinking.  You cannot look to one person in history to get your ideas from no more than you can look to history to gain a very firm moral foundation for todays society.

We are much different than people even 100 years ago!  People in history should be considered as a whole in evaluating and devising an opinion.  They can be influences, but the biggest influence should be the culmination of knowledge as a whole.

We are definitely smarter and wiser than people in the past.  We are the end product of history.  And someday we will be left behind and the pinnacle of human development will be future generations.  It's just the way things are. 

Originally posted by gnomexxx

Zindaihas, I'm not going to say this to be mean, so don't read it that way.  It's just that I think you should go back and seriously critique what you wrote on your own.  I bet you're a pretty smart guy who can find the errors in what you wrote by yourself.

Thanks for the advice, but I think I'll stick with what I said.

Gnomexxx, you seem like a pretty sharp chap yourself, but for some reason you have an unbelievably condescending opinion of humans who lived before we did.  In response to Finwe, you say that Newton and Einstein should not be given that same credibility in either science or faith (you use the word dogma) because they lived in different eras.  What an incredibly superior attitude to have.  Human beings in the past had the same brains we have today.  They were capable of making most of the same obsevations in life that we make today.  True they could not do things like see microorganisms because they did not have the necessary instruments, but that made them no less smart.

Archimedes, who lived from about 287 to 212 B.C. was one of the most brilliant minds in all of history.  He was a mathematician, physicist, engineer, inventor and astronomer.  He explained the principle of the lever, understood how displacement works, laid much of the foundation for hydrostatics, invented the screw pump which bears his name.  He's the guy who calculated the value of Pi.  It's been recorded that he invented a machine which could lift entire ships out of the water and once destroyed an entire Roman fleet using reflective surfaces.  He did things that my modern mind could even begin to grasp.  And you want to dismiss him as some kind of primitive?

We build our wealth of knowledge on the discoveries of people in the past.  Yes, high school students today start learning calculus in junior or senior years, something adults didn't do in the Middle Ages, but Isaac Newton is the guy who invented calculus.  You tell me which is easier, learning it or inventing it?

In the area of morality, what makes you think we have greater insight today in that area as well?  As I said in my previous post, truth does not change with time.  Murder is wrong.  It always has been and it always will be.  We don't need some kind of discovery to modify our moral foundation.  We have been given a conscience to help us distingush right from wrong.  It is the same conscience that humans also had in past generations.

Based on your view, it would be a given that future generations will be superior to us in intelligence and morality.  I don't accept that premise at all.