posted 11-11-98 09:52 PM ET        

YYYH asked me if I had an all-time favorite quote in the "Life, hapiness and SMAC" thread. Now for some reason I can't find that thread anymore, so I'm posting my reply here.

Actually, my all time favorite is not exactly a quote, but this short text by Adrian Barnett that I find absolutly wonderfull:

"On a clear, cold, moonless night drive out into the countryside. Find a quiet spot and lie on top of your car, looking up and out into the night sky. What do you see? Some might see romantic twinkly stars. Some might see the Glory of the Creator`s handiwork. Some might see the spirits of their ancestors looking down upon them, watching and waiting. Some might find inspiration for a poem, song or painting. I am an atheist, and (as my wife would surely testify) not a very romantic one at that; so what do I see?

Do I see rocks moving in curves, stars slowly using their fuel until they're snuffed out, life popping into a pointless existence only to be destroyed by a meaningless accident, tiny points of white light illuminating dead worlds that we will never see, galaxies flying away from each other for no good reason?

To a certain extent, yes. But there is more than that. Much more.

I see a myriad of coloured suns. For example, the red giant Betelguese. Look for the constellation of Orion, and find the upper-left star (if you're north of the equator). Compare it with neighbouring stars - you can soon see the difference in hue. Stars are not just twinkles of white. All the colours of the rainbow are up there for you to see.

I see chunks of rock, pebbles that have been circling the Sun for a billion years, being drawn into the gravity well of our planet, plunging into the atmosphere and exploding in a streak of silent light. Lying on top of your car, you see one flash across the sky every few minutes. Thousands burn up in the sky every day, their dusty remains drifting down to the ground. While you're sitting in your office, or watching Oprah, or choosing a new brand of toilet paper, ancient bits of the solar system are being violently annihilated a few miles above your head.

I see the Earth hurtling along it's orbital path at sixty-seven thousand miles an hour, creating a bow-shock as it pushes through the thin gases surrounding Sol, and leaving
a trail of hydrogen in its wake. Charged particles from the Sun pour into the Earth's magnetic field, grounding at the North and South Poles as dancing curtains of light. I
see our Moon, pock-marked and white, its rotation halted by millions of years of gravitational braking as it tried to drag our oceans around with it, washing our shores
with the daily tides. Inch by inch, every year, it falls away from us.

I see the Sun itself hurtling along its orbital path around the galactic core, dragging along a shoal of planets, comets, asteroids and moons, ineffectively showering them with neutrinos. Four million tons of hydrogen are burnt in this stellar furnace every second as it performs its alchemy, breaking down light elements and rebuilding them as iron. Sudden bursts of magnetic energy release huge flares and prominences of fire, extending thousands, millions of miles into space before falling back to the
surface. I see our Milky Way, just one of a hundred billion others ploughing through space in a great river of galaxies, driven by forces on a scale that the human mind can barely begin to comprehend.

I see galaxies colliding, slowly and inexorably, their contents spread so thinly that it is hard to think of it as a collision at all. On a different scale, they smash into and through each other, ripping themselves apart and sending their stars swirling off to form elongated curls and spirals, eventually settling down into new galaxies and clusters of stars.

I see space distorted by the weight of a cluster of galaxies, forming a lens hundreds of thousands of light-years across. A giant magnifying glass creating multiple images of distant stars that would otherwise be obscured by the very galaxies forming the lens.

I see millisecond pulsars - exotic objects billions of light-years away, spinning hundreds of times a second and pumping out flashes of light at a regularity that our best technology would struggle to match. I see quasars - bizarre creations throwing out more energy than the stars of a hundred galaxies combined.

I see vast glowing nebulae, huge clouds of gas slowly condensing and heating - the birthplace of stars. The universe was not formed with a fixed set of stars - they are
dying and being born every day, and their planets along with them.

I see black holes spinning at unimaginable speeds, dragging the stuff of space-time around with them; warping and bending space; slowing and maybe even stopping time itself. As they spin, they pull in gases, asteroids, dust and any stars unfortunate enough to be caught by this irresistible force. The matter joins a disc spinning down into the multi-dimensional whirlpool faster and faster, until it is destroyed and releases a scream of X-rays. The lucky particles that escape are ejected from the disc as twin jets of matter travelling at speeds nearing that of light.

I see binary star systems. A tiny but brilliant white dwarf and a massive but dull red star spinning around each other like mismatched ice-skaters holding hands. Spiralling closer and closer, eventually they may collide, or one will suck the life out of the other, connecting the two via a bridge of plasma and burning hydrogen.

I look up, and for each and every star I can see on the clearest of nights, I know that there are a million galaxies that I cannot see. Too distant and too faint, moving away from us so quickly that their light is shifted out of the tiny visible spectrum. Only seen by powerful computer-guided telescopes that can focus on a tiny patch of the sky for day after day, collecting photons one at a time. Our galaxy contains an almost incomprehensible number of stars, but this is just one galaxy of hundreds of billions just like it. We can estimate and write down the total number of stars in the universe, but it's nothing more than a number on a piece of paper. There are more stars than our imaginations could ever deal with.

I see planets orbiting a distant sun, detectable only by the tiny wobbles they create in the motion of their host. Are they tiny burnt cinders like Mercury, or toxic hellholes like Venus? Are they cold, dead worlds like Mars or monstrous gas-giants like Jupiter and Saturn, with a core of metallic hydrogen or maybe even diamond? Are they so cold they have seas of liquid methane, or mountain ranges of frozen ammonia? Do they have deep, warm seas teeming with life - odd creatures being selected by evolution for their ability to survive out of the water, crawling up an alien beach under an alien star, the first faltering steps on stubby limbs that might be fins or might be legs?

I see stars finally exhausting their fuel and collapsing as their nuclear engines can no longer overcome the pull of their own gravity. The star falls in on itself and explodes in a catastrophic supernova, expelling iron, carbon, silicon and all the stuff of life out into the universe. (In the night sky, a star suddenly brightens until it
outshines the full moon, dazzling the tiny amphibian stumping up the muddy beach.) The shock waves from this destruction compress nearby gases, starting them on the long journey that will see them condensing into hot, spinning clouds. Clouds that will eventually form new solar systems and give rise to life that can look up and out into
the clear night sky. And think, and wonder, and let their minds take them on a journey that their bodies can never achieve.

Carl Sagan said, "We are made of star stuff". Religion teaches that we are Children of God, and the heavens declare His Glory. The reality is, as Rev. Chuck said, "far greater than your religion could ever allow for".

This is a godless universe and it thrills me that I have the chance to ride along with it, even if only for my few decades of awareness. Many people turn to religion saying, "But there has to be more to it all than this." To them I say, "Look around you! What more could you ask for?" In terms of Truth, Beauty and Wonder, all the worlds religions cannot compete with a clear, cold, moonless night.

We are star-stuff, you and I. We are children of the supernova and our beginnings lie in the death of a star."

Wasn't it great? Anyway, while it's not a quote, this text marked me profondly and is my all-time absolute favorite. I hope that answered your question YYYH.

Now if you reply, please don't quote me your favortire part of Genesis or tell me that God loves me anyway, for if you feel like doing this, I think that you completly missed the point of this text. And, btw, if I wanted that, I would have posted it in one of the religious threads. =)

posted 11-11-98 10:05 PM ET            

Thanks Maya, that was cool.

posted 12-09-98 02:07 PM ET            

Hope you'll excuse my posting a non-quote in your great quote thread.

I just have to tease DJRRebel a bit...

Have you thought about the definition of religion? Basically, a religion is a system of belief(s). Have you thought of what this makes atheism...?

The only rational stance on religion is agnosticism.

posted 11-12-98 08:41 AM ET            

The text is beautiful, but maybe it takes the real experience to get the whole picture. It reminded me of some years ago, a clear, moonless (but warm, not cold, fortunately) night in a garden in spain, looking at the sky and letting your thoughts flow, for hours. Depending on your temper, mood and what-know-I, you may just feel bored or it may be incredibly interesting. The experience is difficult to be expressed in words, but this text brought back those memories. Thanx Maya.

And I just love that disclaimer: "Now if you reply, please don't quote me your favortire part of Genesis or tell me that God loves me anyway, for if you feel like doing this, I think that you completly missed the point of this text." (oops, sorry for the smiley...)

posted 11-12-98 08:48 AM ET            

....a stone,a leaf, an unfound door;of a stone,a leaf a door.

And of all the forgotten faces.

Naked and alone we came into exile.In her dark womb we did not know our mothers face;
from the prison of her flesh we have come into the unspeakable and incommuniable prison of this earth.

Which of us has known his brother?

Which of us has looked into his fathers heart?

Which of us has not remained forever prison-pent.
Which of us is not forever a stranger and alone?

O waste of loss,in the hot mazes,lost among bright stars on this most weary unbright cinder,lost!

posted 11-12-98 10:46 AM ET            

Anyways, religious people can sometimes not comprehend how some of us (atheists) don't believe in anything, but the fact is, we believe in that text !!! We do have a God, and it is called our Universe, and just because it created us by accident doesn't make it any less worthy of awe !!!

posted 11-12-98 11:31 AM ET            

I wouldn't want to ruin the quote by trying to remember it with my crappy memory !!!

posted 11-12-98 08:04 PM ET            

When religious people pity me for not 'feeling God's love', I always feel they've got it all wrong - their religion is what stops them from seeing the real beauty of life. Of course, stupid as I am, I'm never really able to really describe my point of view and make them understand - Barnett, though, puts it SO eloquently.

He uses the cosmos (which is very impressive in all its grandeur) to make his point, but the essence would be true for more 'mundane' stuff as Earth nature, Earth culture or Earth people too. It's just that these things are so common, people sometimes forget how beautiful they really are. All in all, we're living in the best of all possible worlds - we just don't realize it...

posted 11-13-98 06:02 AM ET            

"Although for those of you who do, I consider you to be my brothers and sisters !!!"

posted 11-13-98 07:36 AM ET            

Two really nice quotes which, IMO, fit well in here:

"One of the most tragic things I know about human nature is that all of us tend to put off living. We are all dreaming of some magical rose garden over the horizon--instead of enjoying the roses that are blooming outside our windows today."
(Dale Carnegie)

posted 11-14-98 11:06 AM ET            

1.Where did the universe come from ?

2.Where did the gases that create stars come from?

3.Where did plantes come from ?

4 How did life start on earth ?

5.How did the metorites(SP) land on earth to create life ?

6 Why was earth so planed out ?

7Why did cilivization develop ?

8. Why had Earth been a chosen planet to have life ?

9 What created the moon ?

10 What created the Sun ?

11.Maya what Religon were you before you stoped beliving ?

posted 11-14-98 11:45 AM ET            

Ok, here goes: Agaone's questions are basically: where does the universe come from, and where does life come from. My answer: I haven't got the foggiest.

However, the introduction of God doesn't solve these questions, it merely confuses matters. It's the old (incredibly boring) 'if God made the universe then who made God' question - if you can believe God is eternal or created itself or whatever, then I can bloody well say the same things about the universe (if I wanted to, which I don't).

If the concept of a creator makes perfect sense to you, that's fine I suppose.. It makes perfect non-sense to me, but then it doesn't really matter - it's not why I'm an atheist anyway.

posted 11-14-98 12:43 PM ET            

Indead Tolls !!! (smiley)

Roland ... I really liked the first quote alot !!! Reminds of the one I want Maya to put up by Albert Einstein !!!

hmmmn .. I guess it was too dificult for people to keep religion out of this thread ... too bad !!!

Anyways, now that it's here, DHE ... The fact that you believe in a God of some sort reduces the meaning of that text in a masive way .. heck, if there was a god, I'd even thik less of that passage !!! The fact is, that that passage of text will never mean the same thing to a religious and a non-religious person !!!

Aga1 .. If you have to ask those questions, then you've completely missed the entire point of the text !!! The reason we think religion is not for us (to put it extremely politely), is because religion just invents answers to all those questions .. it's easy to answer all those questions with "God made the Sun .. God made the Moon .. God made the gases (After having beans for lunch)" .. the fact is, that those answers are just made out of ingorance the sciences of chemistry and physics are pure and tangeble .. we may not have the answers for 99% of the questions of the universe, but at least the 1% we do have is pure and true as opposed to something someone made up to appease the mases 1000 years ago !!!
Religion in my belief is the easy way out ... sometimes I wish I could believe in God, but I'm glad I don't, because I stand behind my beliefs, not a version of beliefs that someone created for me !!!

And yes, Aga, if you want to resort to questions, then where does God come from ??? Don't give me the pathetic "God's always been there and always will be" .. because no human being can possibly understand infinity in it's purist way .. and if you do, you're lying .. but I'm curious to know if you think you do, that would explain how you were so easily made to be religious !!!

Aga1 >> And who ever said that science was right "all the time" ??? I think that scientists would be the first to point out that we as humans know patheticaly little of the universe ... I said 1%, but in reality it's probably more like .000000000001% !!! Science doesn't give us the answers automatically, but it does lead to answers, where as some religions just cover up most questions so it seems like they have more answers, where as in reality they don't !!! Religion places an illusion of order to the universe, but it's merly an illusion, a sugar coated answer to all questions for people to afraid to really know the true answers if they are ever presented to us !!!

I don't know Maya very well, (except that she's smileyfobic), but I think it's safe to say that she's like me in that we've never ever been religious !!! (Again, standing from your point of view, this probably doesn't make any sense !!!)

And I really don't think question 12 has any relavance to the matter, but I'm sure Maya will tell you for herself if and when she returns !!!

Aga1 >>> Sorry if I'm a little harsh in my arguments, but I think you at least wanted an honest reply, unfortunately I've said those same statements about a million times in the last year, so my answers are getting shorter and shorter and more to the point .. sorry if I offended you in any way, but I think that I at least made my points clear for you !!! (smiley)

posted 11-14-98 03:03 PM ET            

P.S. No, I didn't read any of Aquinas's works, that's the basic summary I'm familiar with. Ask a Catholic for a more in-depth analysis of his works, most of my religious knowledge I learned on my own, not in my lax as heck Presbyterian Sunday School.

posted 11-14-98 03:17 PM ET            

My point is that religious mind is normally one who will not seek scientific enlightment !!! Religion accepts science, so long as it doesn't interfere with the existance of God and the bible !!! But if you can't take science for 100% of what it offers, what's the point ??? You're just cheating yourself !!! Just think of where mankind would be today if religion hadn't messed up thousands of years of progress !!!

We would be on Chiron today, not just playing a game about it !!!

Anyways .. I thought this thread was going to be for quotes !!!

posted 11-14-98 09:49 PM ET            

1- I see that the Life, SMAC and hapiness thread is back from where ever it was gone. So I checked it out and found that it was Shinning1 and not YYYH that asked me this. Sorry.

2- Well, I guess the title of the thread wasn't clear enough...
Aga1: leave my parents out of this okay?

3- Now to the more interesting stuff:

I'm glad you liked it JB. And no, it's not from a book, it's from his website: http://www.abarnett.demon.co.uk/

Would it be this one DJ RRebel?

"A man's ethical behavior should be based effectively on sympathy, education and social ties and needs; no religious basis is necessary. Man would indeed be in a poor way if he had to be restrained by fear of punishment and hope of reward after death."
-- Albert Einstein

And here are a few of my others favorites from him:

"Gravity cannot be held responsible for people falling in love."

"If we knew what it was we were doing, it would not be called research, would it?"

And the one already quoted by Roland:
"Only two things are infinite, the universe and human stupidity, and I'm not sure about the former."

"Where's MAYA?" [DJ RRebel]

I'm here... no need for CAPS! =)

"Anyways .. I thought this thread was going to be for quotes !!!"

Me too...

*Hugs*
-Maya

posted 11-14-98 10:29 PM ET            

but then again maybe we should remember the words of Anne Frank:
"What a christian does is his responcibility (sp?).
What a jew does is every jews respocibility."

posted 11-14-98 11:06 PM ET            

The gasses came from the singularity that exploded in what science calls The Big Bang. They formed into planets simply enough, through the work of gravity. Dense areas of the cloud of expanding matter clumped together, forming galaxies, solar systems, stars, planets, moons, asteroids and comets.

posted 11-15-98 01:28 AM ET            

Hehe, you are probably right. But to quote AUH20: "Just as John Brown and the Black Panthers did not diminish the legitimacy of the abolitionist and civil rights movement," a bunch of ignorant fanatics who probably have held science back does not diminish the legitimacy of religion.

posted 11-15-98 02:35 AM ET            

So with all these facts combined, it's safe to say that the participants in this forum are on average more logical and better educated for their ages !!! This being said, I'm thinking it's fairly safe to assume that there are many more Athiests in here per capita than in day to day life !!!

posted 11-15-98 02:39 AM ET            

Good to see you back here .. you still keeping the same crazy schedule of all work and no play ???

posted 11-15-98 02:46 AM ET            

TO me the universe itself is just so mind numbingly awsome in its complexity .. that passage is awsome, but hardly scratches the surface of it's awe !!!

I believe Athiests, just like religious people also have different views within themselves !!! They just appear to be similar because the religions seam so far appart based on their viri=ying pieces of fiction !!! (sorry bout that cheap shot, but it's the clearest way of putting it !!!)

posted 11-15-98 12:17 PM ET            

1.Where did the universe come from ?

--The universe was created when the Big Bang occured, while it is not known what caused the Big Bang, we do know it happened.

2.Where did the gases that create stars come from?

--When the Big Bang happened, all the matter in the universe spewed out. That is where the gasses came from.

3.Where did plantes come from ?

--Planets were created when the cloud of gas that was our solar system condensed, and compacted.

4. How did life start on earth ?

--Science does not have a definite answer to this question. My Biology book last year gave three distinct theories each with far more proof than "God made it."

5.How did the metorites(SP) land on earth to create life ?

--Who said that Meteorites landed on earth to create life?

6. Why was earth so planed out ?

--The Earth is by no means planned out.

7. Why did cilivization develop ?

--Civilisation developed because it was advantageous to man. He was the only animal that had a brain large and complex enough to develop civilization. As tool use increased, human populations increased, and evolution began to select against stupider people.

8. Why had Earth been a chosen planet to have life ?

--The Earth was chosen at random. Maybe there are beings on Chiron asking themselves why Chiron was chosen. This question is flawed, because no matter what random planet civilization develops on, it will ask itself why it is there.

9. What created the moon ?

--The moon just like the planets was formed when the primeval solar system condensed.

10 What created the Sun ?

--The sun as well as the moon and the planets all come from the same source.

posted 11-15-98 01:30 PM ET            

I'd like to keep this a quote thread... discussions are better in other threads.

"The difference between what the most and the least learned people know is inexpressibly trivial in relation to that which is unknown. " (Albert Einstein)

Yes, we know little. What about the things we don't know ? Either you fill it with religion, or you keep an open mind. Sorry for that discussion input.

"Don't walk in front of me, I may not follow. Don't walk behind me, I may not lead. Just walk beside me and be my friend."
(Albert Camus)

posted 11-16-98 08:44 AM ET            

A quote that reminds me of Maya's "godless universe":

posted 11-16-98 10:58 AM ET            

What I mean is, there is a relation where the more scientificly inclinent a person is, the more inclinened he/she is to not being religious !!! This to me is a fact, as science conflicts more and more with religion (another fact even you would have to admit) !!!

So with that being said, >>>MY OPINION<<< is that most scientist are above average in intellegence (not neccisarily wisdom) .. and therefore I derived that the more intellegent a person is, the less inclined he or she is at being religious !!!

This IS NOT to say the there aren't many SMART&RELIGIOUS people out there ... there are ... I'm virtually sure of it, but on the average, I think my opinion is correct !!!

Look at the 20th century, sure all religions have grown as they like to claim, but they look at it in terms of numbers, when you look at it in terms of percentage, most of them are giving way to Athiesm !!! The percentage of Athiest people has grown dramatically in the century that has seen mankind gain the most in terms of average intellegence !!! THIS IS A FACT !!!

Just as probably saying religious people on average are more happier (not a fact ... but who knows) !!!

So, once again, I'm not saying any of you are at all stupid !!! In fact, my opinion also states that people who like SMAC type games are inclined to be more logical !!! Again this is my opinion .. I cannot prove it, but I'm sure most of you will agree with it !!!

I mean, even religious people have to admit that religions is illogical .. it is ... just try to prove ... not only do you not know how, but you don't even try ... science is all about tring to prove things logically !!!

*sigh* ... anyways, this argument is really pointless, we'll never agree! And that's fine ... it really doesn't bother me ... I just feel sorry for you for being blinded by your faith, and you feel sorry for me for being "unenlightened"!

Look on the bright side though ... lol .. if you're right, you'll be able to laugh at me when we die, but if I'm right, who cares !!! ... I just can't bring myself to believe in something just for the sake of being on the "safe side" !!!

posted 11-16-98 06:02 PM ET            

Much as I'd like to agree with you, being agnostic with athiest tendancies and a strong believer in science, I really can't here. You're wrong in saying it's a fact - it's actually a statistic, and as everyone knows, 98.7% of all statistics are lies, and the rest are made up. There's also absolutely no evidence whatsoever to suggest that humankind has increased in average intelligence during this century - we have advanced technologically, but that advancement is based on earlier advancements and on rapid population increase. (More people = more people available to work on increasing our knowledge base.)

posted 11-17-98 03:53 PM ET            

Two examples, one from Egypt as I described, and one from the middle ages:

At the Royal Ontario Museum in Toronto, there is an extensive wing devoted to ancient Egyptian artifacts. Included in that show is a stone bottle, beautifully shaped, sanded and polished - including the inside. This bottle has a very long, narrow neck, but studies using modern analytical equipment have revealed that even the much wider interior of the bottle are polished and sanded. Modern science has absolutely *NO* idea how they were able to accomplish this as no known configuration of tools should be able to reach that far into the bottle to sand the upper surfaces, past that long, narrow neck. It remains a complete mystery.

Next example - catapaults. Medieval catapaults are known to have been able to lob good sized boulders with a great deal of force to knock down walls of castles, yet despite our modern engineering methods, we are likewise completely unable to duplicate the effects of catapaults as they are described in period texts... we can't even come *close*. How they got so much power is another mystery, even if you assume the accounts of the catapault's power are exaggerated. (And there are realistic limits on how far you can assume that - they were knocking out huge stone walls with these things.)

posted 12-09-98 02:09 PM ET            

Hope you'll excuse my posting a non-quote in your great quote thread.

I just have to tease DJRRebel a bit...

Have you thought about the definition of religion? Basically, a religion is a system of belief(s). Have you thought of what this makes atheism...?

The only rational stance on religion is agnosticism.

As far as your li'l argument up there a ways goes, that would ... "on average" ... make me more intelligent than you are, DJRRebel... *ROFL*

posted 11-17-98 03:55 PM ET            

As for where matter came from, let me expand on some of the earlier answers. Immediately after the big bang, due to the enourmous amount of energy involved particles were created, and these in turn because all of the hydrogen we see in the universe today, a large percentage of the helium, and a lesser amount of the lithium. Due to slight variations in density, these collected under gravitational influence to form galaxies of stars. As these stars aged, they fused the simple elements into heavier ones, up to iron in the heaviest stars. When the heaviest stars(and shortest lived) could no longer sustain themselves against gravity, the died in supernova, creating the rest of the known elements up to Uranium(and possibly beyond, ISTR someone finding trace amounts of natural Plutonium, for example). The expanding gas clouds, containing all of these new elements first expanded, combining with the clouds of other supernovae, and the collapsing in parts, again due to density fluctuations and also pressure from nearby older stars. Thusly the solar sytem was born, from the sun at the center to the Oort Cloud at the outer fringes.

posted 11-18-98 09:59 AM ET            

If you have read the conclusions of Toynbee in his works on the rise and fall of civilizations, he concludes that every civilization comes to a point, a time of crisis, where it must go through an etherealization,a spiritual transformation,or it will die.I emphasize the word spiritual, not a mundane change.It also seems to me that we have been accumulating knowledge on this planet for some time now,and it seems then that at some point, if knowledge can save us that civilizations should have stopped rising and falling a long time ago.

posted 11-18-98 10:27 AM ET            

Intellegence, simply put, is the ability to grasp concepts .. and the massive amount of information in the current world around us boost our ability to understand things !!!

posted 11-18-98 10:52 AM ET            

I can't beleive you think we've gained more than we've lost !!! lol .. Um .. we've found cures for thousands of deseases ... ummm .. we have electricity and therefore computers TV's radios ... we can have conversations with people on the other side of the world as if they were in the next room !!!
We can travel the world in a matter of hours instead of months ... we can leave this world !!! Our quality of life is so much bettter now compard to before ... and even you can't argue that the average life expectancy of humans has gone up .. or is that another conspiracy theory ??? lol

The fact is, that you are partially correct that we are all given our potential intellegence at birth, but as we grow, we absorb information, and the more information we absorb, the easier we absorb it !!!

Take a typical rocket scientist in California (for arguments sake) ... he would not even begin to think about building rockets if he was born in a Zulu in africa, or if he was born in 3000BC Babylonia ... he lacked the proper education to be able to grasp those thoughts!

And even if you still don't agree with me for some bizzare reason, then your argument is still useless, because my first statement would then be the number of religious people per capita has dropped in relation to rising wisdom .. it has the same effect .. so either way, I don't see how you don't understand what I'm trying to say !!!

posted 11-18-98 03:26 PM ET            

----

posted 11-18-98 06:50 PM ET            

A little late, but Aga1, the reason your questions upset some people is that they presume the Earth and Humans are a calculated design whereas a lot of atheists (myself included) believe we're just one big cosmic "oops". There is NO particular reason for our being here and there does not need to be. Put simply, we exist because the atmoic combinations that make up people happened to form in such a way that it formed a sum greater than it's parts and that sum has a notion of "existance". There is no particular reason for civilization (other than it is a cool game) and no particular reason that humans are where we are (other than we out-competed the competition).

As for the intelligence debate and whether or not we're smarter now... Beavis+Butthead, Professional Wrestling, drunk driving, Arkansas, etc.

We may have more accumulated knowledge now and we may stay in school longer than people did 100 years ago, but I doubt that in the last 100 years people have actually acquired an increased genetic ability to learn more. We just spend longer excersing the ability to learn so that at the end of the learning period we appear to be "smarter" than our ancestors.

posted 11-18-98 09:11 PM ET            

Going back to the lost technologies department, another rather surprising find was the discovery that at least one ancient Mediterrainean civilization had indoor plumbing. It was an island nation which is suspected to have given rise to the legend of Atlantis. They had a number of fairly sophisticated technologies, of which a great deal of physical evidence still remains... it took us a long, long time to clue in to the potential of indoor plumbing again.

posted 11-18-98 09:23 PM ET            

The difference between modern steam engines and ancient ones is that the ancient ones were hardly more than toys, steam powers tops.

posted 12-09-98 02:12 PM ET            

Hope you'll excuse my posting a non-quote in your great quote thread.

I just have to tease DJRRebel a bit...

Have you thought about the definition of religion? Basically, a religion is a system of belief(s). Have you thought of what this makes atheism...?

The only rational stance on religion is agnosticism.

As far as your li'l argument up there a ways goes, that would ... "on average" ... make me more intelligent than you are, DJRRebel... *ROFL*

>>CARNATIONS! Sorry for reposting - #1 went up to the beginning...<<