thanks for posting these bud.
i remember years ago stanford did on-line material,which was awesome.
then one day they wanted "student identification numbers" and "social security numbers" and "actual names"...
yeesh..what did they want next?....money?

I think the most compelling argument is this:
1) Before we were born, we didn't exist.
2) We exist now.
3) Therefore there is evidence that we can go from nothingness to existence.
4) Therefore after we die (ostensibly transitioning from existence to nothingness) there is no reason that we could not transition from nothingness to existence again. This supports either Buddhistic reincarnation or a Christian heaven.
5) In fact, the preponderance of the evidence suggests so, since we have evidence that we can transition from nothingness to existence, but nothing supporting the atheistic view that death is extinction, and nothing can happen to us after dying.

and

6) I think the Christian notion of life after death is more plausable than the Buddhist one, since the Christian cosmology of a creation with a beginning and end is supported by scientific facts, but Buddhist cosmology that the world has existed eternally and we've all been born an infinite number of times doesn't match science at all.

In my mind the idea of coming into existence strongly supports... the notion of a return to nothingness.

Dust to dust, and all that.

The numbers don't add up for reincarnation. I think people have done studies. Pesky math.

No, I'm not religious... but I prefer Buddhism to Christianity any day of the week!

ShakaUVM:
the matter your body is composed of existed before you were born and will continue to exist after your death. sorry

the matter your body is composed of existed before you were born and will continue to exist after your death. sorry

I'm talking about consciousness / self-awareness / being.

The fact that our consciousness transitioned from nothingness to existence is the sole fact we have in the matter, so the preponderance of the evidence can only point to Buddhism or Christianity, and as I said, scientific evidence favors Christianity over Buddhism.

No, I'm not religious... but I prefer Buddhism to Christianity any day of the week!

Of course - this is Videosift.

I'm talking about consciousness / self-awareness / being.
The fact that our consciousness transitioned from nothingness to existence is the sole fact we have in the matter, so the preponderance of the evidence can only point to Buddhism or Christianity
so you're just assuming some kind of dualism. and jumping from that to any specific brand of religion is a giant non-sequitur.

>> ^ShakaUVM:
...scientific evidence favors Christianity over Buddhism.

Mind expanding on that thesis?

Consciousness is such a difficult subject. I think it's in this series that he makes the parallel to a smile.

What is a smile - we all sort of know what it is, and we have a word for it, but a smile is only the abilities of the face, lips, muscles etc. A smile in itself does not exist, only as the form the face takes.

Consciousness is not necessarily anything in itself, as most cognitive scientists would say, it's the illusion of a separate item - it is the features of the brain that make up the consciousness.

Scientific evidence rejects them both - you can't say one is more false. I'll agree that it is easier to reject Buddhism as scientific fact though.

Consciousness is not necessarily anything in itself, as most cognitive scientists would say, it's the illusion of a separate item - it is the features of the brain that make up the consciousness.

Even if consciousness is an illusion, the illusion is real. (Unless you're arguing you do not have any conscious experience? I've always wanted to meet a p-zombie.) Cognitive Scientists study the neural correlates of consciousness, the objective facts about neurons and such, without having any theory at all about explaining how subjective experience is generated.

This "illusion" of our consciousness did not exist (as far as we can tell) before we were born, so the only fact we have is that consciousness can emerge from nothingness. Perhaps you might draw your own conclusions from that, but the factual evidence of reality does support the notion of life after death over permanent nonexistence.

Of course, I don't expect atheists to pay much attention to facts that disagree with them (we're all humans, naturally), but it is amusing to hear, since atheists tend to pride themselves on their evidence-based worldviews.

Mind expanding on that thesis?

Some of the central theses of Buddhism revolve around the eternal existence of reality. For example, the "Meditation on Love" states, simply, that since the universe is infinitely old, we've all at one point or another, been each other's mothers, daughters, sons, fathers, brothers, sisters, etc., and so we should treat each other as if every other person is both our mother and our daughter - because they were. It's really quite beautiful, but it doesn't sync up with the scientific reality that our universe had a beginning, and that in fact there wasn't any life until relatively recently.

Other lessons revolve around there being a constant number of living beings at all points in time, which disagrees with the science for the same reason.

The Christian idea of a created universe with a finite beginning and the gradual emergence of life matches our current scientific understanding. The Buddhist conception does not.

>> ^ShakaUVM:
Mind expanding on that thesis?The Christian idea of a created universe with a finite beginning and the gradual emergence of life matches our current scientific understanding. The Buddhist conception does not.


Oh, you mean the "When God created the heavens and the earth in six days" part?

You consider that scientific?

When you speak of life appearing relatively recently, you realize that you are only speaking of our own planet.

You can't say the same for other planets, nor can you say the same for other solar systems in other galaxies.

You have to consider that the phenomenon that we call "life" is in itself a very specific chain of events, and that there are probably other forms of life somewhere out there that do not cohere to our definitions, but they are alive nontheless.

I'm sorry, but to claim that the Big Bang theory proves Christianity correct and Buddhism incorrect is speculative at best, and very arrogant.

In short, you have no proof. You are drawing a conclusion based on limited facts, the same as me, the same as everybody else, and your conclusion is, at best, nothing more than a guess, or a wish.

" the factual evidence of reality does support the notion of life after death over permanent nonexistence"
Aaah, I'm not going to flat out agree or disagree with that. "Life after death" implies that the life is sort of like the one we have now, or that "something carries over" to the second life. This I reject wholeheartedly, and the evidence does in no way support that idea.

That the molecules in our body may one day organize themselves in another living being is, well, obviously true. We were not "nothing" before, our molecules were scattered into other things. Our bodies are constantly getting new energy and burning of energy, which shows that we do "get" new molecules, which can easily have been in someone else at some point in time - this does not mean that I have had past lives, or that my consciousness is anything else than a process of my body and brain. When the machine breaks the software dissipates.

"Of course, I don't expect atheists to pay much attention to facts that disagree with them (we're all humans, naturally), but it is amusing to hear, since atheists tend to pride themselves on their evidence-based worldviews."

Don't be snide, it doesn't suit you. If the evidence do in fact disagree with me, I will consider it. Present your evidence at your convenience.

@rougy
Oh, you mean the "When God created the heavens and the earth in six days" part?
You consider that scientific?

Keep in mind I'm not a Biblical literalist. But yeah. Insofar as it was written by a semiliterate goatherder thousands of years ago, yeah, our current scientific understanding matches the Christian conception of creation. It doesn't match the Buddhist one.

When you speak of life appearing relatively recently, you realize that you are only speaking of our own planet.
You can't say the same for other planets, nor can you say the same for other solar systems in other galaxies.

Oh, sure, it's possible (even likely) that life evolved (or created, take your pick) on other planets before Earth. But if you've studied cosmology, there's a large period of time that having any life at all existing would be rather dubious (without divine intervention, I suppose).

Having any period of time without life is bad for Buddhism, in fact.

I'm sorry, but to claim that the Big Bang theory proves Christianity correct and Buddhism incorrect is speculative at best, and very arrogant.

Prove? Did I say prove? I said supported once, and favors another time. Which is the appropriate level of confidence to use in this case. If you were held at gunpoint and forced to pick between Christian and Buddhist worldviews on the ultimate nature of reality, based on our current scientific understanding of the universe, a rational person would pick Christian.

(And if you'd say neither, you've fallen off the logic wagon a couple steps back.)

In short, you have no proof. You are drawing a conclusion based on limited facts, the same as me, the same as everybody else, and your conclusion is, at best, nothing more than a guess, or a wish.

Which is why I never used the word proof, but argued instead from the fact that the evidence favors life after death instead of extinction.

The facts are 1 to 0, as it were. You can certainly believe in what you'd like against the evidence (taking it on blind faith as it were), but you can't claim it's especially scientific to do so.

@Gwiz:
Aaah, I'm not going to flat out agree or disagree with that. "Life after death" implies that the life is sort of like the one we have now, or that "something carries over" to the second life. This I reject wholeheartedly, and the evidence does in no way support that idea.

Right. Which is why at no time did I claim that a reincarnated individual, for example, would have any memory of his past life.

The claim is about the you (the "you" sitting behind the drivers seat of your body, and not me) that could occur again after death. While it sounds wildly implausible, the fact that it has happened already is our only solid point of evidence, so it would be rather irrational for us to arrogantly claim it could never happen again.

Of course, in a "resurrection of the body" type environment, such things would be possible.

>> ^iwazaru:
so you're just assuming some kind of dualism. and jumping from that to any specific brand of religion is a giant non-sequitur.

I don't think that the dichotomy between dualism and materialism is meaningful beyond a certain sense of historical importance.

Is an idea different from, say, an apple? Trivially, yes. Is a thought located somewhere within our craniums? Trivially, yes.

So they're both true. Or both false. Take your pick.

There's a variety of flavors of dualisms and materialisms, but I don't think any are very good ways of trying to explain the world.

There is no "driver behind the eyes", so to speak, but I know what you're getting at. Purely theoretically, molecules could form that made up the exact same "self" as the one I have now. But I don't see the difference between reincarnation and this? I don't think this could ever happen. The complexity involved is so enormous the the statistical chance of it being able to happen (again) is close to nothing.

>> ^ShakaUVM:
@Gwiz:
Aaah, I'm not going to flat out agree or disagree with that. "Life after death" implies that the life is sort of like the one we have now, or that "something carries over" to the second life. This I reject wholeheartedly, and the evidence does in no way support that idea.
Right. Which is why at no time did I claim that a reincarnated individual, for example, would have any memory of his past life.
The claim is about the you (the "you" sitting behind the drivers seat of your body, and not me) that could occur again after death. While it sounds wildly implausible, the fact that it has happened already is our only solid point of evidence, so it would be rather irrational for us to arrogantly claim it could never happen again.
Of course, in a "resurrection of the body" type environment, such things would be possible.

>> ^ShakaUVM:
I think the most compelling argument is this:
1) Before we were born, we didn't exist.
2) We exist now.
3) Therefore there is evidence that we can go from nothingness to existence.
4) Therefore after we die (ostensibly transitioning from existence to nothingness) there is no reason that we could not transition from nothingness to existence again. This supports either Buddhistic reincarnation or a Christian heaven.
5) In fact, the preponderance of the evidence suggests so, since we have evidence that we can transition from nothingness to existence, but nothing supporting the atheistic view that death is extinction, and nothing can happen to us after dying.


Wow. I am so... compelled.

>>Wow. I am so... compelled.

Brilliant counterargument.

The funny thing is, that's how, mm, maybe 75% of atheists react to the argument. They can't formulate a reason why I'm wrong, they just "know I'm wrong". And... oh look a monkey!

There's a lot of irony to that, if you really think about that.

>> ^gwiz665:
There is no "driver behind the eyes", so to speak, but I know what you're getting at. Purely theoretically, molecules could form that made up the exact same "self" as the one I have now. But I don't see the difference between reincarnation and this? I don't think this could ever happen. The complexity involved is so enormous the the statistical chance of it being able to happen (again) is close to nothing.

Well, that's a different argument, actually: If the universe were to be infinitely old, in fact, you have probably existed before, with the exact same atoms and such. It's not infinitely old, but still an interesting argument.

But even still, it doesn't interest me very much that if in the future someone creates an exact duplicate of myself. My consciousness won't magically transfer from my dead body to the new one, so it's irrelevant. It's like those transporters on Star Trek - they annihilate one body and create a duplicate in another place. I'd never step on to one of them.

No, I'm talking about your conscious self, self-awareness, stream of consciousness, whatever it is that you'd like to call it. I think the only counterargument is that you're not actually a conscious entity. Which seems rather at odds with reality. Assuming, of course, that you do have conscious experience.

>> ^ShakaUVM:
If you were held at gunpoint and forced to pick between Christian and Buddhist worldviews on the ultimate nature of reality, based on our current scientific understanding of the universe, a rational person would pick Christian.


The fearful one would pick Christian.

You know why I don't want to go to heaven? Because I've heard it's filled with Christians.

In all seriousness and jest....

You are exactly like the pope who mocked Galileo Galilei when he claimed that the earth revolved around the sun.

The Pope said something like "Look above you, what do you see? Isn't it obvious? Even a fool can see that!" And then he said something like "If we're revolving around the sun, where is the wind?"

Just as it is more accurate to say "our sun" rather than "the sun," it is more accurate to say "our world" rather than "the world," and "our universe" instead of "the universe." The Big Bang only applies to the sliver of eternity that we pretend to perceive.

I won't convince you otherwise, nor do I wish to.

I only know that even if I'm wrong, I'd rather be wrong than hang out with people like you, be it in this life or the next.

Shaka,

I hope you stick around.

It's going to be fun debating a Christian (apparently) who is using science to...what did you say?

To claim that science "supports" or "favors" Christianity.

This is going to be fun.

See you around.

>> ^ShakaUVM:
>>Wow. I am so... compelled.
Brilliant counterargument.
The funny thing is, that's how, mm, maybe 75% of atheists react to the argument. They can't formulate a reason why I'm wrong, they just "know I'm wrong". And... oh look a monkey!
There's a lot of irony to that, if you really think about that.


Wow. I am still so... compelled. Your understanding of philosophical argumentation is astounding. There definitely isn't the possibility that your outrageously spurious conclusions do not follow from your premises. Yeeeeep.

In all seriousness and jest....
You are exactly like the pope who mocked Galileo Galilei when he claimed that the earth revolved around the sun.

Kinda the opposite, really.

To claim that science "supports" or "favors" Christianity.

This is going to be fun.

Between the Buddhist and Christian worldviews? Undoubtedly.

While I have carefully written down your objection to the notion that Christianity and science are compatible, I've also noted you don't disagree with me on this point.

>> ^ShakaUVM:
While I have carefully written down your objection to the notion that Christianity and science are compatible, I've also noted you don't disagree with me on this point.


Science and any religion are incompatible.

Religion is a matter of faith, science is not.

1) Did Jesus Christ claim that the world, or universe, had a distinct beginning?

2) Do you know of any other religions that have a similar story? i.e. that a supreme being created the world or the universe from nothing at some point in time.

>>Science and any religion are incompatible.

The difference between science and religion is the difference between how and why.

They answer two different fundamental questions, and so are quite compatible.