Tag: Science and Religion

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Step 1.1 Thy will be done on Earth…by chance

August 17, 2019

From the scientists:

It is clear that chance is operative in the World as an ordinary state of affairs.

For the religionists:

Even the Lord’s Prayer directly implies that God’s Will is not operative in the World as an ordinary state of affairs.

Otherwise, why would anyone have to pray for that to be the case?

So Science and Religion, at least Christianity, should agree about the centrality of chance. They should also agree about the absence of God’s Will as a natural force in the Universe.

Nothing happens for a reason – unless we make it happen for a reason. Therefore, never justify personal action as being what God “wants”. Nobody knows what that might be, if anything.

Haiku to the New Haiku

MOE

M.I.C.H. – Modernity, Intelligence, Complexity, Humanity

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Of Briefcases and Walls

August 16, 2019

How is it that a briefcase can be heavier on both sides at the same time?

We place the briefcase against the wall. It falls away.

We turn it around. It falls away.

How can a briefcase be heavier on both sides at once? Is there a repelling force? Science gives no clear explanation for this common phenomenon.

MOE

M.I.C.H. – Modernity, Intelligence, Complexity, Humanity

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A Book That Writes Itself

Sunday August 11, 2019

In answer to last Sunday’s question:

If you were all powerful, what the devil would you need?

The author of all things, what in Heaven would you read?

Humans feel powerless and out of control, but are power mad and controlling. They create deities in their own image. So they imagine that an all-powerful being would spend all its effort controlling everything, all the time. Because that’s what they would do if they could.

The opposite makes more sense. An all-powerful being would more likely create, and delight in, something which generated unforeseen outcomes. (How eternally boring if thought always came into being! No surprises.) So it might make a book that writes itself and stay out of the way as the characters write the story. Spoiler alert! Since it would exist outside of time, if it wanted to know how things turned out it could skip ahead. For the characters in the book, chance might be fundamental and dominate their universe – just as seems to be the case in ours.

MOE

M.I.C.H. – Modernity, Intelligence, Complexity, Humanity

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Step 1 – Accept Chance

The first in a series of short Sunday posts on science and religion – toward a religion where we don’t have to pretend anything.

Sunday August 4, 2019

How often have we heard “nothing happens by chance” or “everything happens for a reason” ?

When, in fact, we know from experience that more or less the opposite is true.

Science is right on this one. Chance is not only operative in the world, it forms the basis of everything that goes on. The deeper you dig into the fabric of the universe, quantum fields and such, the more this appears to be so.

So, in order to have a religion where we don’t have to pretend anything, the first thing we need to do is accept chance as central to the operation of the universe.

How this could be so, and why it does not necessarily stand in opposition to the existence of any god, is simple, obvious, and will be posted next week.

MOE

M.I.C.H. – Modernity, Intelligence, Complexity, Humanity