Things You Can't Prove, But Believe

[Terminate421]

How strange that a thread about what we believe in became a thread about who is right and who is wrong.

 

[Mycroft Holmes]

the same could be said by evolution through natural selection. This is not to say that I do not find natural selection nonexistent.

If you believe in objective reality then the case for macro and micro evolution under the natural selection doctrine is exactly as proven as the theory of gravity. Google examples of speciation or check out its wikipage.

The funny thing of course being that the current theory of gravity has holes in it when we move out into space and bring other phenomena like dark matter into the mix, whereas evolution is thus far flawless and more likely to remain true than the theory of gravity.

I do not however believe we came from monkeys.

No one in the history of ever has said that we came from monkeys. If you think anyone has said that, then you have been talking to people who have no fucking clue about evolution or evolutionary theory. 0% of professors who believe in evolution think we came from monkeys, Richard Dawkins does not believe that, Darwin did not believe that, Erasmus did not believe that.

So lets do some simple bio and taxonomy.

1)Monkeys are not apes. No we evolved from monkeys, they don't even say we evolved from apes. They say we are from the same family as apes. Cercopithecidae is the family for most species of monkeys, of which Humans are not a member.

2)Humans are in the ape family. More specifically the great apes. More specifically and scientifically known as Hominidae(seen here http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hominidae) of which Humans, Orangutans, Chimpanzees, Bonobos, and Gorillas are all members.

3)While we are also somewhat related to monkeys(as we are also related somewhat to cockroaches) what people assert(when you either mishear them as saying we are related to monkeys or hear perfectly well people who have no understanding or training in biology say it) is that we are cousins of the Great Apes, and most closely the Chimpanzees. And you would be no closer to being correct in saying that we evolved from Apes than you would be in saying that everyone's parents are their 2nd cousins thrice removed. You and your cousin had the same Great-great-great-great-grandparent, your cousin is not your father. Just like a long long long time ago two species split and one of them became Humans and the others became Chimpanzees. Chimps didn't just stop evolving and suddenly we budded off of them. We both evolved away from a common ancestor, just like your 2nd cousin thrice removed is probably way different than you.

And befor you bring up "oh religion has caused problems too!"

No it hasn't. Douchebags are douchebags no matter what colors they fly. Hitler said he was Christian, Stalin said he was atheist, Mao said he was atheist, Mehmed the fifth(Armenian Genocide) was a Muslim, the inquisition was run under Catholics. Pol pot didn't need to be an atheist to butcher tens of thousands of people any more than the Mongolians needed their religion to stack 90,000 decapitated heads in front of Delhi.

People often use religion to justify their behavior, but a justification isn't a root cause. Here's an example. The Sultanate of Rum and the Ottoman Empire both were expansionist Empires, the latter of which went so far as to advance into the Balkans and up to the point where it threatened Austria, Italy, Germany. It likely would have beaten them as well had the crusades not occurred. And if it had beaten them, France, England and Spain would have been next and they all knew this. So they united together to stop the Ottomans. But the average age of death for the non-nobility that made up the bulk of armies in the middle age was somewhere between 25-35. So how do you convince, say an English peasant, that he has to go and fight people in some place that's going to take him half a year to get to. Hes going to have to fight there for 4 at least, and then he can go home. Do you tell him it's because the nobility don't want to be deposed and that your King is afraid if the Austrian King is deposed that he will be next? That because of that some peasant has to give over a fourth of his time in life to save some king, all the while abandoning his entire family who he will likely never see again?

Hell no, you tell them that God wants them to do it, and that if they follow you there, they will be rewarded in heaven. The crusades weren't caused by religion. Religion was the excuse, they were caused by politics and economics.

 

[Terminate421]

the same could be said by evolution through natural selection. This is not to say that I do not find natural selection nonexistent.

If you believe in objective reality then the case for macro and micro evolution under the natural selection doctrine is exactly as proven as the theory of gravity. Google examples of speciation or check out its wikipage. If you assert that it's not true, then you are calling billions of people, including the entire population of industrial era London, liars.

The funny thing of course being that the current theory of gravity has holes in it when we move out into space and bring other phenomena like dark matter into the mix, whereas evolution is thus far flawless and more likely to remain true than the theory of gravity.

I do not however believe we came from monkeys.

No one in the history of ever has said that we came from monkeys. If you think anyone has said that, then you have been talking to people who have no fucking clue about evolution or evolutionary theory. 0% of professors who believe in evolution think we came from monkeys, Richard Dawkins does not believe that, Darwin did not believe that, Erasmus did not believe that.

So lets do some simple bio and taxonomy.

1)Monkeys are not apes. No we evolved from monkeys, they don't even say we evolved from apes. They say we are from the same family as apes. Cercopithecidae is the family for most species of monkeys, of which Humans are not a member.

2)Humans are in the ape family. More specifically the great apes. More specifically and scientifically known as Hominidae(seen here http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hominidae) of which Humans, Orangutans, Chimpanzees, Bonobos, and Gorillas are all members.

3)While we are also somewhat related to monkeys(as we are also related somewhat to cockroaches) what people assert(when you either mishear them as saying we are related to monkeys or hear perfectly well people who have no understanding or training in biology say it) is that we are cousins of the Great Apes, and most closely the Chimpanzees. And you would be no closer to being correct in saying that we evolved from Apes than you would be in saying that everyone's parents are their 2nd cousins thrice removed. You and your cousin had the same Great-great-great-great-grandparent, your cousin is not your father. Just like a long long long time ago two species split and one of them became Humans and the others became Chimpanzees. Chimps didn't just stop evolving and suddenly we budded off of them. We both evolved away from a common ancestor, just like your 2nd cousin thrice removed is probably way different than you.

And befor you bring up "oh religion has caused problems too!"

No it hasn't. Douchebags are douchebags no matter what colors they fly. Hitler said he was Christian, Stalin said he was atheist, Mao said he was atheist, Mehmed the fifth(Armenian Genocide) was a Muslim, the inquisition was run under Catholics. Pol pot didn't need to be an atheist to butcher tens of thousands of people any more than the Mongolians needed their religion to stack 90,000 decapitated heads in front of Delhi.

People often use religion to justify their behavior, but a justification isn't a root cause. Here's an example. The Sultanate of Rum and the Ottoman Empire both were expansionist Empires, the latter of which went so far as to advance into the Balkans and up to the point where it threatened Austria, Italy, Germany. It likely would have beaten them as well had the crusades not occurred. And if it had beaten them, France, England and Spain would have been next and they all knew this. So they united together to stop the Ottomans. But the average age of death for the non-nobility that made up the bulk of armies in the middle age was somewhere between 25-35. So how do you convince, say an English peasant, that he has to go and fight people in some place that's going to take him half a year to get to. Hes going to have to fight there for 4 at least, and then he can go home. Do you tell him it's because the nobility don't want to be deposed and that your King is afraid if the Austrian King is deposed that he will be next? That because of that some peasant has to give over a fourth of his time in life to save some king, all the while abandoning his entire family who he will likely never see again?

Hell no, you tell them that God wants them to do it, and that if they follow you there, they will be rewarded in heaven. The crusades weren't caused by religion. Religion was the excuse, they were caused by politics and economics.

I should put a giant sign over my older posts.

Look, I was angry and I only had my iphone when I posted that. Do I take it back? Not really. But do I support it? Not really.

I'm not a hypocrite but I do manage to be quite lenient on how I see things, while I am catholic, I am not down to the word for word interpretation that people have. But I do easily get angry at people like Abedeus who find it necessary to take pot shots at what I believe and probably would get off to me typing something like "Oh you are right, I wasted 18 years of my life believing in a false deity, I should convert to this random individuals beliefs"

There is actually a rather deep scene at the end of an old movie about the Scopes trail of the 1940's (Or was it the 30's? I forget) the point was that it was creationism vs. evolution. But the point is, at the end of the movie, one of the lawyers walks into an empty court rooms to get his things, picks up a Bible in one hand and a Charles Darwin book in the other. He looks at both of them and then puts them together under one hand and leaves.

I'm not blind as to what science brings us and shows us, but I do find that the bible teaches about us in figurative ways. At the top, running the show, is a higher power, in this case God.

I guess I could say I'm a casual catholic.

 

[Ectoplasmicz]

Extraterrestrial life. I mean beings as advanced as us. I don't have proof, but I damn well know that it is out there.

 

[Mycroft Holmes]

How strange that a thread about what we believe in became a thread about who is right and who is wrong.

Strange? Never, THIS IS THE INTERNET.

though misplaced

Nope.

I dont claim to KNOW god doesnt exist.

Then why are you trying to disprove something you admit you cant.

This arguement of "its your job to disprove god" is so obviously fallacious i dont even know.

Which fallacies does it break?

Here's a list for reference: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_fallacies

An absence of evidence is not evidence of absence.

The null hypothesis is the default.

A baby doesn't not believe in God. It has no opinion on the matter because it does not know as it has no knowledge of the subject. It does not believe that God exists, and does not believe that there is no God. Because the default is absence of knowledge, and absence of believe in either a negative or positive value.

Lets do an experiment with the burden of proof being on YOU to back up the claim

I don't back up claims of metaphysics ever, because I realize it's not a provable prospect.

"Khaine is the bloody handed lord of murder and demands sacrifice right now". You must now back up the claim he doesnt exist, or failing that, start sacrificing. Surely? Unless its up to ME to prove khaine is real. Which it is. It always is.

You can't prove Khaine to be true or false. But I wouldn't sacrifice to him even if he was true, anymore than I would worship the Christian God. I hold them to the same morality I hold myself to, and because they violate my morality I would rather burn in hellfire forever than kowtow.

The assumption that something is false isnt a claim.

Hitler doesn't exist isn't a claim then. Cool.

And interestingly enough you will have exactly as much of a chance to prove he exists as you do that God exists, that Europe exists, that your own hands typing away on your keyboard exist.

Also in real science the null hypothesis is NEVER "we dont know". The null hypothesis is the assumption NOTHING happens.

But we already used Occam's Razor to disprove science. Duh doy.

 

[xXGeckoXx]

I believe in continuity external to my perception, but it would be damn hard to prove it.

This is fantastic. I was trying to say this but I am not word-smithy enough to fit it into that few words.

 

[xXGeckoXx]

snip

A bit off topic but I have a question for you. I have never been a religious guy but the thing you said about not being about to "suddenly drop the deity you have been believing in for 18 years". Most casual religious people I know don't really believe, they more participate in the culture. I was wondering do you believe in the gods or are you culturally religious?

Disclaimer: just interested no real goal with this post.

 

[zehydra]

I believe that logic works. You cannot prove that logic works, because that would require logic.

 

[BNguyen]

I believe that censorship is wrong and awful, but this is merely my belief of course. However, I still am conflicted over hate-speech being allowed because I hate bigotry, racism, and any form of prejudice. I wouldn't stop a Neo-Nazi from getting his book published, it's his right to put out his views (and also to be ridiculed by me), but if there was a planned Nazi rally in my neighborhood I would try to stop it from happening.

Most of science.

For example, I can't prove on my own that quarks exist but I believe the scientific reports that have proved their existence.

Agreed.

Also I found the example you mentioned to be amusingly coincidental, cause I actually know the guy who won the Panofsky Prize for providing scientific evidence of the quark structure (not that I understand any of it).

it's not words in particular that are the problems for bigotry and racism but rather the feelings that we put behind them and the actions we take that give them any meaning at all. we just need to stop attaching the words to the actions or thoughts and they lose their function

 

[Programmed_For_Damage]

Beside God and ghosts (the latter I've seen but can't prove), I have the following theory on ideas:

I believe that all creative ideas exist in the ether somewhere just waiting to be ?born? into this world. All it takes is someone to be open to this and they receive the idea. If you don?t act on the idea when it chooses you to give birth to it, it passes on to the next open recipient and so on until that idea becomes reality.
A friend and I came up with this theory after talking about all the times we had started writing a great song/story, etc only to find out that someone had beat us to the punch by not a long period of time. Also my wife showed me this idea she had for a redesigning the playground in the Child Care centre she works for. It was quite a unique design and she'd told no one except me about it. A few months later another Child Care centre re-did their playground exactly the same as her design despite her never showing the plans to anyone.

This could be partially explained if there was such thing as a "global consciousness", which I'm not adverse to the idea of.

 

[Mycroft Holmes]

I'm not a hypocrite but I do manage to be quite lenient on how I see things, while I am catholic, I am not down to the word for word interpretation that people have.

If you have the time, you should read The Kingdom of God is Within You by Leo Tolstoy. As well of some of his other essays about Biblical theory. If you didn't know Tolstoy's interpretation of Jesus' Sermon On the Mount is the basis for all modern nonviolent movements. Without him there would have been no Velvet Revolution, no Gandhi, no MLK, no Bayard Rustin, no Arndt Pekurinen, no Arab Spring.

But I do easily get angry at people like Abedeus who find it necessary to take pot shots at what I believe and probably would get off to me typing something like "Oh you are right, I wasted 18 years of my life believing in a false deity, I should convert to this random individuals beliefs"

Beliefs are only what you make of them, do what works for you and fuck the haters. If you are satisfied in what you believe, then there is no reason to get angry with someone who you think is wrong. And if you aren't satisfied, then change what you believe. It's as simple as that.

I'm not blind as to what science brings us and shows us, but I do find that the bible teaches about us in figurative ways. At the top, running the show, is a higher power, in this case God.

I wasn't trying to attack you on science, and I apologize if it came off that way. There is simply a staggering amount of people, especially in the US, who have very poor understandings of Evolutionary theory and I like to correct them whenever I'm able.

There is actually a rather deep scene at the end of an old movie about the Scopes trail of the 1940's (Or was it the 30's? I forget) the point was that it was creationism vs. evolution. But the point is, at the end of the movie, one of the lawyers walks into an empty court rooms to get his things, picks up a Bible in one hand and a Charles Darwin book in the other. He looks at both of them and then puts them together under one hand and leaves.

Darwin was kind of a douche. His grandfather, the much more awesome, Erasmus came up with evolution, and taught it to Darwin. The title of Darwins book is usually appended, the full title is: On the Origin of Species by Means of Natural Selection, or the Preservation of Favoured Races in the Struggle for Life. Which isn't to say he was wrong, just that hes a douche and there's a lot better scientists out there to listen to including ones on evolutionary theory.

 

[ultrachicken]

Some form of God.
Now, before you all have a rant at me, I said 'some form of'. Not "The Christian God" or any other one, but some kind of creator.
I just find it immensely hard to believe that we, humans, who have advanced beyond our primal instincts so much that we barely resemble our fellow animals, happened by accident.
The world is too awesome for me to just think it was all random.

The thing is, now you've just moved the question of origins. We came from a creator, who very deliberately created us, but what created it? If that creator was not made deliberately, then it would have to be randomly, and thus, an extremely awesome thing was created by accident. If that creator was made deliberately by another creator, you have to have an infinite conga-line of Gods.

 

[Tyrant55]

Only fools believe what they cannot prove. If you can't offer evidence, you've no reason to believe it.

Faith is the absence of thought, as they say.

The problem with this though is that, as others have pointed out, it's very difficult to really definitively prove much of anything. You can offer plenty of evidence without proving anything. Take my example of state of mind being the most important factor for living long and being healthy. Can I prove that it's even more important than say diet or exercise? Can I prove that a positive outlook will have a positive physical impact, and add years to your life? No, but there is strong evidence supporting the idea. We know that mood affects your hormones, and that your hormones affect pretty much everything about you, so from that it would seem logical that a better mind = better body to some degree. There is a difference between not having enough evidence to definitively prove something beyond a shadow of doubt, and having no evidence whatsoever and just believing something because it seems like a nice idea.

 

[Fiz_The_Toaster]

That somewhere... big breasted perfect ass horny female aliens are on their way to Earth to "greet" us.

And on that day... there will be a lot of lonely human females in the world.

That's okay, we'll just drink all the beer and eat all the nibblies.

 

[Terminate421]

snip

A bit off topic but I have a question for you. I have never been a religious guy but the thing you said about not being about to "suddenly drop the deity you have been believing in for 18 years". Most casual religious people I know don't really believe, they more participate in the culture. I was wondering do you believe in the gods or are you culturally religious?

Disclaimer: just interested no real goal with this post.

I just believe in the one god that catholicism created. I truly don't know his plans or anything like that.

But I definitly don't let my religious part interfere with my life. Its there, and I do the church on sundays thing but, aside from holidays, I don't freak out over it.

I do remember to pray every now and again.

Thanks for being respective about it =p

 

[Terminate421]

I'm not a hypocrite but I do manage to be quite lenient on how I see things, while I am catholic, I am not down to the word for word interpretation that people have.

If you have the time, you should read The Kingdom of God is Within You by Leo Tolstoy. As well of some of his other essays about Biblical theory. If you didn't know Tolstoy's interpretation of Jesus' Sermon On the Mount is the basis for all modern nonviolent movements. Without him there would have been no Velvet Revolution, no Gandhi, no MLK, no Bayard Rustin, no Arndt Pekurinen, no Arab Spring.

But I do easily get angry at people like Abedeus who find it necessary to take pot shots at what I believe and probably would get off to me typing something like "Oh you are right, I wasted 18 years of my life believing in a false deity, I should convert to this random individuals beliefs"

Beliefs are only what you make of them, do what works for you and fuck the haters. If you are satisfied in what you believe, then there is no reason to get angry with someone who you think is wrong. And if you aren't satisfied, then change what you believe. It's as simple as that.

I'm not blind as to what science brings us and shows us, but I do find that the bible teaches about us in figurative ways. At the top, running the show, is a higher power, in this case God.

I wasn't trying to attack you on science, and I apologize if it came off that way. There is simply a staggering amount of people, especially in the US, who have very poor understandings of Evolutionary theory and I like to correct them whenever I'm able.

There is actually a rather deep scene at the end of an old movie about the Scopes trail of the 1940's (Or was it the 30's? I forget) the point was that it was creationism vs. evolution. But the point is, at the end of the movie, one of the lawyers walks into an empty court rooms to get his things, picks up a Bible in one hand and a Charles Darwin book in the other. He looks at both of them and then puts them together under one hand and leaves.

Darwin was kind of a douche. His grandfather, the much more awesome, Erasmus came up with evolution, and taught it to Darwin. The title of Darwins book is usually appended, the full title is: On the Origin of Species by Means of Natural Selection, or the Preservation of Favoured Races in the Struggle for Life. Which isn't to say he was wrong, just that hes a douche and there's a lot better scientists out there to listen to including ones on evolutionary theory.

Its okay, I didn't come off as you trying to attack me on science. You are in the right here. Any flaws were a bit out of rage. But I have calmed down. Silly me.

I'll look up the book you mentinoed, its not every day a friendly face comes around like this.

 

[Freechoice]

I believe that most intangible beings like ghosts and spirits and God are as real as people believe them to be. Its sort of like that theory that God survives on prayers but applied to all things that cannot be normally seen or felt.

Silly, I know, but it runs with my belief of "Truth/Beauty is all in the eye of the beholder"

That reminds me of how the orks in Warhammer 40k just cobble together bits of metal and string and make guns and effective armor. It works because they believe it works.

In the name of the WAAAAAAAAAAAAAGH, the warboss and the holy dakka, amirite?

 

[rayen020]

-that a god exists.
-that faster than light movement is possible
-most of science
-that there are places in the world that i can't see
-that if a tree fell in the woods and no one was around to hear it, it would make a f***ing sound.

 

[Denamic]

This arguement of "its your job to disprove god" is so obviously fallacious i dont even know.

Which fallacies does it break?

Here's a list for reference: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_fallacies

An absence of evidence is not evidence of absence.

Shifting the burden of proof.
You cannot prove a negative, as such, the one positing the positive has the burned of proof.
For example, you cannot prove that something that does not exist does not exist.
Therefore the one claiming that it does exist has the burden of proof.

And absence of evidence is absolutely evidence of absence.
There's absolutely no evidence that invisible unicorns exist, which is evidence enough to draw the conclusion that they do not exist.
But maybe they're just really good at hiding.
Being invisible and all.

 

[Nannernade]

That eventually they will run out of ideas for new pokemon
That 3D is just a gimmick and is almost out the door
That we do have at least a few original ideas left in us