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Mordhaus (Member Profile)

The newest “pentagon confirmed” UFO is Bokeh effect

moonsammy says...

I've tried to make the argument that aliens couldn't have possibly crashed on Earth, and that the whole idea is insane. So advanced aliens managed to acquire sufficient expertise at space travel to actually cross the unimaginably vast gulfs between stars, but they haven't figured out how planets and gravity work?

Maybe I should just give UFO believers copies of Sagan's "The Demon-Haunted World" and tell them I'm willing to discuss after they read it.

newtboy said:

UFOs are real.
Alien spacecraft on earth are not.
The distances between stars make interstellar travel a pipe dream.

Carl Sagan Predicted Trump With Charlie Rose

Hail Satan?-Trailer

USDA: Eggs are NOT Healthy or Safe to eat

transmorpher jokingly says...

With attitudes like yours, it's not wonder so many vegans are leaving Earth and returning to the Vega sector. It's hard enough being here and missing the blue light of our home star. (I'm referring to Carl Sagan's "Contact" for anyone not sci-fi literate )

newtboy said:

Bwaaahahaha!
Vegans (or Vogons for that matter) complaining about false advertising is like Hotblack Desiato's ship calling a cup of dark tea "black".

Buttle (Member Profile)

To make an apple pie from scratch...

To make an apple pie from scratch...

The Pale Blue Dot - Told Through Cinema

Mordhaus (Member Profile)

If Meat Eaters Acted Like Vegans

ahimsa says...

“Humans — who enslave, castrate, experiment on, and fillet other animals — have had an understandable penchant for pretending animals do not feel pain. A sharp distinction between humans and 'animals' is essential if we are to bend them to our will, make them work for us, wear them, eat them — without any disquieting tinges of guilt or regret. It is unseemly of us, who often behave so unfeelingly toward other animals, to contend that only humans can suffer. The behavior of other animals renders such pretensions specious. They are just too much like us.”- Carl Sagan/Dr. Ann Druyan

newtboy said:

Wow. You really are speaking with authority on a subject you are ignorant about, aren't you? Look up Masai, or Inuit. Both survive on a meat only (or almost only) diet out of necessity. So much for "nobody on this planet is currently in that situation, probably never will" [be].

You are not superior. You are narcissistic. It seems that's a side effect of being vegan...you ALL have this false sense of superiority. That alone is enough reason to keep eating meat.

When people have no sense of humor about their own ideals, it's proof positive that they are insecure in them.

Vegans are not diverse when it comes to doing their little superior dance. They all do it, then all go pat themselves on the back for being a vegan douche to some 'evil carnivore' (by which they mean omnivore).

BTW, chimps are OMNIVORE, not carnivore....you know, that THIRD category of eaters that nearly all animals fall into, but which vegans choose to ignore.

BS, vegans are like ex addicts, always trying to make their bean curd taste and feel like meat. They fail miserably, but they continue to try and try....because meat tastes good and they miss it. You find the THOUGHT of meat revolting, but you still LOVE the taste.

Mordhaus (Member Profile)

Mordhaus (Member Profile)

Mordhaus (Member Profile)

Our Greatest Delusion As Humans - Veritasium

dannym3141 says...

I don't think i've done a very good job of explaining my point, because:
1) I do not believe in the god of the gaps in any sense, i reject the notion.
2) I didn't ask for a "reason"; this is a subtle point that i'll try to make clearer.
3) I don't hold any "supernatural" beliefs in the sense you mean - not a single one.
4) I believe firmly in things that i can prove to myself, and am uncertain about things that i cannot supply any proof or reason for.

Why are we here? When i ask that question, i am not asking for a reason for our existence; a goal that humanity collectively must achieve. I am asking why do we find ourselves and our reality as we find it? We use science to describe it and become nonplussed by these amazing things but fundamentally, what is charge? Why do opposites attract? Why does mass attract mass, etc.? Isn't it all a bit weird and wonderful?

There is no answer to that question in physics. To use the term "supernatural" to describe a discussion of why/how (which lies beyond the jurisdiction of physics) is either naive or derogatory because the term is philosophy.

You reject the notion that you could go from not existing to existing, finding yourself in a world of things you don't understand. Yet you seem to find it unremarkable that at one point you went from not existing to existing, finding yourself in a world of things you didn't understand. If i put you in a fully immersive Skyrim game, unconscious and without memory, you'd play that game and think it was real. You may even believe that, once you died, you'd cease to exist. But one day, you die in Skyrim and everything ceases to be, before you're transported to a world of things you don't understand. Yet there were no mechanisms within the Skyrim universe to allow for that! In other words, what about things that exist or take place outside of our 3 spatial and 1 temporal dimensions, or perhaps beyond even our understanding of dimensions?

"There has to be a mechanism" is idle speculation on your part, and demonstrates your closedness to anything that might exist beyond our perspective of 3 dimensional space (which might be behind the "why?" and god of the gaps misunderstanding) - for which there is evidence and on which there is active and significant research. Besides, the absence of evidence is not evidence of absence. This is not the god of the gaps, this is acknowledging our limitations and constraining our certainty accordingly.

It's odd that you quote Sagan, because he often spoke about the spiritual and the unknowable/ineffable. I think he would be more aligned with my assessment than yours, as he was an agnostic and rejected the label atheist.

Possibly we continue to exist, perhaps we don't. Perhaps 'exist' and 'not exist' are human concepts that don't mean anything in the bigger picture, and the parts of us that exist outside of 3 dimensions bathe forever in rivers of custard (or something really weird that can't be explained in english). Nobody knows and no guess is less likely or less educated, in my opinion, which is based on my lack of certainty and absolute bewilderment that we did the not-exist->exist cycle in the first place - but i welcome any argument or evidence you can provide counter to this, and my mind is open to them.

ChaosEngine said:

First of all, those are two completely different questions. What happens (presumably you mean after death?) doesn't necessarily have anything to do with why we are here.

It could be that nothing happens after death, but there is still some grand purpose to existence. Or it could be that there's an afterlife, but the universe itself is meaningless.

As to what do I really know? The answer is, of course, nothing. No-one can really know anything about what happens outside of our existence and anyone who tells you they do is either lying or delusional.

However we can make an educated guess (and not even a "so called" one, a real one based on centuries learning about the universe we inhabit) Every time we make a new discovery, it has turned out to have a natural explanation. As we learn more, the "god of the gaps" has grown smaller and smaller, to the point where we know that even if there is some mystical force underlying the universe, it has no measurable effect on it.

*related=http://videosift.com/video/Physicist-Sean-Carroll-refutes-supernatural-beliefs

If our consciousness really does continue after our physical bodies die, there has to be a mechanism for it, and there is zero evidence of any such mechanism.

It could be that we simply lack the tools or the understanding to detect this, but there isn't even anything leading us to ask the question (e.g. an unexplained phenomena that would prompt us to investigate a hypothesis that might lead to a theory).

As to why we are here? From a scientific point of view, there's no evidence to suggest there is a reason to anything. The universe just is. From a philosophical point of view, I've always liked Carl Sagan's idea that "we are a way for the cosmos to know itself".

TL;DR We really know nothing, but it's pretty unlikely that anything happens after death or that there is a reason we are here.



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