Hawking says there are no gods

[kellyb]

Time is stuff “running” from event to event.

Time as a measurement is events separated by events.

An event is an instance of "now".

Space as a distance is stuff separated by stuff.

Stuff is that which exists and "just is".

Who needs mind-altering substances when you can just trip out on contemplating and trying to understand space-time, huh? lol

 

[ynot]

Who needs mind-altering substances when you can just trip out on contemplating and trying to understand space-time, huh? lol

And no serious side-effects

 

[qayak]

Time is very much like space. It is the separation between events.

So space is the physical distance between events and time is the distance in time between events?

Time doesn't "run", it just is. That symmetry between past and future is real.

Time must run because if it doesn't everything happens at once.

The laws of physics are (basically) symmetric under time-reversal, but the universe itself isn't symmetric: there is a period of very low entropy in the past, and that defines a direction toward the past that is distinct from toward the future.

Yes and that is defined by the laws of entropy

The laws of physics are also symmetric under translations in space, but the earth locally isn't: the earth's gravitational field defines a direction of up that is distinct from down.

Up and down are just our perception of gravity. Anything moving due to gravity appears to be falling (going down) while anything moving counter to gravity is rising (going up). Up on one side of the earth is the same direction as down on the opposite side. It isn't Earth's gravitational field that defines the directions up and down, it is the mind of the observer.

This is also the same with time. Many cultures look forward to the future and back to the past but some look forward to the past because it is the only part of time you can see, and know, while the future is behind them because it is something they cannot see or know.

 

[Roboramma]

And this is where I tap out. That is WAY over my head. Starting with the laws of physics being symmetrical, I'm lost.

Is it really "just" or primarily entropy differences between two points in time which prevent backwards travel/motion in time?

Look at the worldline of an object. It's not "moving" through time, it simply exists within spacetime. So in this sense there is no motion forward or backward through time. To put it another way, if you want to draw an arrow on that worldline and say that the object is moving through time, you can equally well draw it forward as backward. Once you've drawn it in one direction, though, the way that the physics works, you're never going to get it's trajectory to curve through more than 45 degrees (which would equate to traveling at the speed of light). That inability to curve beyond 45 degrees is what it means to say you can't go back in time. This is the way in which the geometry of time differs from that of space.

To put this differently: you have the conditions of the universe at a particular moment of time. You can use them to determine the conditions of the universe at a later moment of time, but you can equally well use them to determine the conditions of the universe at an earlier moment of time, and the equations for doing so are the same equations.

What does "The laws of physics are also symmetric under translations in space" mean?

That the laws of physics work the same no matter where you are in space.

 

[David Mo]

So let's see who agrees with me that Zeus was claimed to live on Mount Olympus if I type in "where did the Greeks believe Zeus lived" into Google.

Wikipedia
British Museum

And every other link on the first page of results.

Have you considered that it may be you that is wrong on where the ancient Greeks believed their god Zeus lived?

Once again:

What Wikipedia and multitude of web pages tell is the conventional summary of Homer and Hesiod's narrative on gods. Their theogonies were literate. They were not the totality of actual religions of Greeks. For example, Homer scarcely mentions Dionysus although he was one of the most important gods of Greece.
Other example: Homer says that the gods lived on Olympus. This location is vague because other authors place the residence of gods over Olympus, in heavens. In addition, the Greeks believed that temples and other natural places are the home of gods. Therefore Zeus lived in Olympus and the Acropolis of Athens, some caves and the ether in general.

In short: If a Greek had climbed up Olympus and would find nothing three reactions would be possible: that gods don't exist, that he was near the presence of intangible gods or he never went because he previously knew that Homer's Olympus is an analogy and Olympus is a hard mountain to climb.

Science has nothing to do with the two latter. Even Google-Earth only can affect those that are predisposes to be affected. The effective work is previous.

 

[David Mo]

Because he understands that the gods are nothing but fairy tales? Or is he engaging in the same goalpost shifting all believers indulge in when it turns out that the claims of their religion don't match reality? Simply saying 'oh no Christian believes the garden of Eden was a literal place today' does not erase the fact that their faith certainly did take such things to be literal right up until they failed to match up with reality. 'Metaphor' is not a magic word that excuses the absurd claims that various religions have made that turned out to be untrue.

You virtual atheists are very funny but not serious. A sincere believer is not a cheater. He usually is a sincere believer that found some important meaning on some text. In any case if you treat him directly as a cheater the debate ends and the ruckus starts. Is it what you want? Not me.

In a debate you have to find persuasive arguments. What are your arguments against someone that think that some allegorical sense is hidden in a sacred book? Are they scientific, philosophical or common sense? This is the question.

 

[David Mo]

Yes. A chemical anlysis showing no longpig absolutely refutes the insane belief that someone is actually consuming the body of a man. It doesn't matter how much you, or anyone else want to believe that there's another layer of reality that can only be access through really high level theology, it simply isn't true.

All the wishful thinking in the world isn't going to change that.

"It is so because It is!"

I see. You have a dogma. It is impossible to debate with dogmatic people, either believer or atheist. The same stuff in opposite fields.

 

[Roboramma]

So space is the physical distance between events and time is the distance in time between events?

No, both are measures of the separation between events.

Time must run because if it doesn't everything happens at once.

Plot out everything that happens on a spacetime diagram. Now look at that diagram, where is the motion of time?

Yes and that is defined by the laws of entropy

Could you clarify what you mean by this? I'm not sure whether I agree with you or not.

Up and down are just our perception of gravity. Anything moving due to gravity appears to be falling (going down) while anything moving counter to gravity is rising (going up).

This is not just perception. It's a measurable difference in the strength of the gravitational field. We can measure it in the curvature of the paths of objects. It's a fact that if I pour the contents of a bottle of water on the top of an incline it will flow down that incline, but if I pour those same contents on the bottom of an incline they won't flow up that incline.

Up on one side of the earth is the same direction as down on the opposite side. It isn't Earth's gravitational field that defines the directions up and down, it is the mind of the observer.

Of course it's the earth's gravitational field that defines those directions, and down is always locally pointing toward the center of the earth.

If it were only in the mind of the observer, and not an object fact about the earth's gravitational field, then different observers would disagree, but there are objective tests that each can do to determine their orientation in the earth's gravitational field.

This is also the same with time. Many cultures look forward to the future and back to the past but some look forward to the past because it is the only part of time you can see, and know, while the future is behind them because it is something they cannot see or know.

None of that changes the facts about time. For instance, my actions now can affect the future, but not the past. This is a consequence of the fact that the early universe was in a low entropy state.

 

[David Mo]

Because he understands that the gods are nothing but fairy tales?

"Nothing but fairy tales" is an abusive way to simplify the problem. Many are able to differentiate fairies from their respective sacred objects. Not cultured persons necessarily.
This relation implies an special intuition or perception more or less inexplicable. This is what they say. In any case, this relation is described in some complex ways and nuances that are not the naive "seeing a fairy". Science cannot do nothing about this. It works in a different (physic) level of language. What then?

 

[David Mo]

Yes. A chemical anlysis showing no longpig absolutely refutes the insane belief that someone is actually consuming the body of a man.

No Christian thinks he is eating a man with the host. It is the flesh of a god. A very different substance.
Why don't you stop simplifying the subject?

 

[Garrison]

"Nothing but fairy tales" is an abusive way to simplify the problem. Many are able to differentiate fairies from their respective sacred objects. Not cultured persons necessarily.

How? Please specify how one can distinguish the difference between a belief in fairies and belief in a particular religion in an objective manner.

This relation implies an special intuition or perception more or less inexplicable. This is what they say. In any case, this relation is described in some complex ways and nuances that are not the naive "seeing a fairy". Science cannot do nothing about this. It works in a different (physic) level of language. What then?

You point out that there is no objective difference between the belief in fairies and gods and thus that there is no reason to accept either as a real thing. If you get some comfort from your favoured religious text that's good, but that in no way shape or form makes the god or gods described in it real and it certainly doesn't reinforce the arguments being made in this thread that gods could exist.

 

[JoeMorgue]

No Christian thinks he is eating a man with the host. It is the flesh of a god. A very different substance.
Why don't you stop simplifying the subject?

Because you won't stop playing "Belief makes things true" argumentative games.

If one person is arguing "Just thinking a cracker is the body part of a man-God literally makes it true" the people talking to him have to simplify it because he obviously needs help getting to the correct answer.

This is, again, the main problem with the internet's philosophy fan club. If you want to pompously put yourself in a position above other people and talk down to them about how they are thinking wrong... you can't be 100% completely wrong about everything you say.

 

[kellyb]

No Christian thinks he is eating a man with the host. It is the flesh of a god. A very different substance.

Incorrect. Read the wiki on transubstantiation again. They even have theology to address whether or not you have literal Jesus-meat turds afterwards.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stercoranism

Transubstantiation, the teaching of the Catholic Church concerning the change of substance by which the bread and the wine offered in the sacrifice of the sacrament of the Eucharist during the Mass, become, in reality, the body and blood of Jesus Christ, has occasioned a large number of subordinate controversies over the centuries relating to just how this takes place. Early Church theologians, such as Origen (184–253), were willing to allow that the consecrated elements of Christ’s body were digested and excreted in the manner of typical food,[1] but the 9th century Carolingian theologian Paschasius Radbertus found this wholly unacceptable.[2]

 

[dann]

That would explain angel farts.

 

[David Mo]

How? Please specify how one can distinguish the difference between a belief in fairies and belief in a particular religion in an objective manner.

Depends on what religion you are talking about. But the religion of the people I'm talking about is quite different. For example, those who believe in fairies believe that they can be photographed or perceived directly, and the persons I am speaking of believe that the sacred is not perceivable by the common senses. It's a big difference.

 

[David Mo]

Because you won't stop playing "Belief makes things true" argumentative games.

I can argue with you with more patience than Saint Job's, but if you start lying this way, the conversation ends right now. For compulsive liars we have enough with the Big Dog in this forum.
If it's not a lie but an obfuscation, I'll repeat it once again and I hope you don't go back to the same thing: I don't believe that believing one thing makes it true. I am not TommyJ. Lets make it clear once and for all.

If one person is arguing "Just thinking a cracker is the body part of a man-God literally makes it true" the people talking to him have to simplify it because he obviously needs help getting to the correct answer.

This is, again, the main problem with the internet's philosophy fan club. If you want to pompously put yourself in a position above other people and talk down to them about how they are thinking wrong... you can't be 100% completely wrong about everything you say.

What is the correct answer you give to a man that that believes that the host is the true body of Christ, but the science can not refute this because It is a divine body? This is the same question I have done you during more than three thousand comments. Without answer. Give the correct answer, please.

Your opinion on philosophy is superfluos.

 

[Tommy Jeppesen]

I can argue with you with more patience than Saint Job's, but if you start lying this way, the conversation ends right now. For compulsive liars we have enough with the Big Dog in this forum.
If it's not a lie but an obfuscation, I'll repeat it once again and I hope you don't go back to the same thing: I don't believe that believing one thing makes it true. I am not TommyJ. Lets make it clear once and for all.


What is the correct answer you give to a man that that believes that the host is the true body of Christ, but the science can not refute this because It is a divine body? This is the same question I have done you during more than three thousand comments. Without answer. Give the correct answer, please.

Your opinion on philosophy is superfluos.

Nor do I. Subjective beliefs about the objective don't become true by virtue of the belief itself. Now subjective beliefs about the subjective is another matter.

 

[David Mo]

Incorrect. Read the wiki on transubstantiation again. They even have theology to address whether or not you have literal Jesus-meat turds afterwards.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stercoranism

What your beloved Wikipedia says is that Christ's body is not a common human body. It seems you read the text in the reverse sense. Trans-substantied, other substance, you know.

I suppose you know St. Paul's doctrine which states that in heaven even the blessed souls will have a body, but spiritual. If it were not so, it would be a mess of past, present and future livers and kidneys .

So the transubstantiated flesh, that is, of another substance, is not seen under the microscope. Religious stuffs.

NOTE: You cannot tell me the catechism stories. I endured the thing till my teen age.

 

[Diablo]

I can argue with you with more patience than Saint Job's, but if you start lying this way, the conversation ends right now. For compulsive liars we have enough with the Big Dog in this forum.
If it's not a lie but an obfuscation, I'll repeat it once again and I hope you don't go back to the same thing: I don't believe that believing one thing makes it true. I am not TommyJ. Lets make it clear once and for all.


What is the correct answer you give to a man that that believes that the host is the true body of Christ, but the science can not refute this because It is a divine body? This is the same question I have done you during more than three thousand comments. Without answer. Give the correct answer, please.

Your opinion on philosophy is superfluos.

My bold. That seems to be badly phrased because the man hasn't asked a question, he merely believes something. If he were to ask, is it true, and refuses to research the answer scientifically or even logically, then there's not much to be said except that he doesn't want to know the answer.

And there's the problem: most people who follow a religion aren't interested in a critical anaysis of whether it is true or not: they are just happy to believe what they have been told.

 

[David Mo]

Nor do I. Subjective beliefs about the objective don't become true by virtue of the belief itself. Now subjective beliefs about the subjective is another matter.

Aha... But this kind of sentences make my mind a damned imbroglio. Do you know: La razón de la sinrazón, que a mi razón se hace, de tal manera mi razón enflaquece, que con razón me quejo de la vuestra fermosura (El Quijote).Use Google Translator, please. I have another job now and I am in a hurry.