The world was created or just is?

Put me down as someone who thinks humans are not intelligent enough or at least currently advanced enough to fully understand time or the origin of existence. I also think that being open-minded about the possibility of a generic "creator" is much different than the affirmative representation that a particular religious book or doctrine provides the sole and exclusive truth.

 

Having a personal relationship is fundamental to being a Christian; I'm curious where you get your perspective from. Context is important; saying "I know there is a God" is different from saying "I know God(Jesus)." The personal relationship is hard to convey to others, so what comes off as knowledge to one person comes off as faith to an observer (and that's not the same "faith" that the person with knowledge has). Have you ever experienced anything, but then you tried to explain it to somebody else...maybe they understood what you were talking about, but they might not *know* it the way you do?

Go GATORS!
,WESGATORS

 

Seems like it would devalue religion if faith in God is the same thing as having 'faith' your buddy will bail you out if you get arrested. The same way having a "personal relationship" with God isnt the same as having a few laughs at happy hour with your friends or attending their kids birthday. Nothing makes a religion more silly IMO than demystifying it in such a way.

 

Zeno was a clever dude, but the dichotomy paradox isn't really a paradox. You can have a seemingly-infinite number of intervals between point A and point B, but that doesn't preclude you from being able to overtake them in a given motion even with time constraints.

Go GATORS!
,WESGATORS

 

Agreed. It's not the same thing. But if you can understand the nuance between having faith and knowledge at that level, then you can at least acknowledge that it's at least possible for these concepts to apply in conjunction with one another as a matter of one's relationship with God.

Go GATORS!
,WESGATORS

 

I recently listened to a podcast with Al Franken and Tim Alberta. Franken asked about what "evangelical" means, and Alberta cited the personal relationship element. The suggestion seemed to be that non evangelicals do not have a personal relationship with God. I wondered whether and to what extent Christians (including Catholics) who do not self-identify as "evangelical" would take issue with that characterization. But yeah, I agree with you that the "personal relationship" aspect is very mainstream and very widespread.

 

Wasn’t there a political party in New York City that asked the same question. lol

 

Look we can examine it from infinite angles, but the central issue is that one cannot claim to know and have tangible proof of God. I don’t think there’s anything wrong with that. It’s ok to say I believe, or have faith. I take issue with the assertion that someone can know God or knows God exists. That takes the faith and belief element out of the equation, and well… that’s a big tenet of Judeo-Christian ideology.

You asked my context… I was raised in a very devout Catholic family and received the sacraments of baptism, 1st Communion, Confirmation, and marriage. Albeit, the marriage was under a different set of circumstances than the first three.

 

The problem with the ID debate is even if we could rule out UD, that leaves an infinity of possible intelligent designers. It leaves an infinity of IDers that aren't even gods & an infinity of IDers that are gods.

So, eliminating some big bang, evolution, etc. literally gets you no where. Prob(xi) = 0 for all xi when x is inf.

 

The grown ups are talking. Save the childish mocking for the cafeteria or recess.

 

Pandora is so 2017.

 

Disagree.

"Something" may have existed but what you see today did not. Everything "happened" at some point.

 

I love this subject... should be fun reading and participating.

 

Good post and I agree generally.
The scriptures actually tell is that faith is a "substance" of things "hoped for" with evidence "unseen".

Doubt exists. Anyone saying it never creeps in is probably lying or living in a spirit of fear.

The scriptures tell us that Jesus own disciples doubted him after his resurrection. They doubted their entire faith and thought the cause had died with Him.

The Christian journey is one of doubting and rekindling many times over.

 

What do you get when you add the dimension of time to a Continuum? You get space time and an infinitely vast Universe... with infinite realities existing in the same exact space.

A Continuum of infinitely hot energy... in an infinitely small space (a singularity) with an infinity of matter/mass. In a Time Dimension of a Continuum you get Space... in an infinitely vast and cold Universe of Space. But with hidden infinity of realities all existing in that same space. All matter eventually breaks down into waves of energy and just like a radio waves you have frequencies that exist all at the same time in the same space. It's an illusion of size (comparing the Continuum of the singularity to Space Time vastness of our visible Universe) made possible by time... with the illusion infinite space.

The real brain teaser is that there was NEVER a beginning to a Continuum... it was never NOT there. And all that we see and hear fells see and know are in that Continuum... only in a Time Dimension which give us a corporeal life in space time. That is our visible Universe.

I have a working theory of the connection between the Infinite Universe and the Continuum. The time before the Big Bang, and it explains dark matter... dark energy... prophecy... past lives... dreams... faster than light travel... it explains everything that science has not yet proven. But the theory is far easier than the math will ever be.

Mathematically... the connection between Infinity of the Universe and The Continuum might never be known.

 

I don't believe that anybody is claiming this. We can have knowledge without tangible proof. Proof is only useful when attempting to convince another of what it is that you know (we can make note of proof for our own value, but we wouldn't classify that as "tangible proof" regardless).

Do you ever ask what the person means before taking issue? What did I say on this note that you find objectionable? When you use the phrase "have tangible proof" it makes me think that you are using specific idea of "know" that others might not be in this regard. In John 17:3, we understand the Greek term for "know" to refer to a deep level of intimacy. I'd be curious to know what that means to you to the extent that you would take issue with such "knowledge."

This is only true if you make the assumption that faith and knowledge cannot co-exist. Personally, I reject that idea, no problem if you don't. The Bible speaks of both, and I believe they are both applicable.

Thanks, do Catholics not believe that faith and knowledge can co-exist?

Go GATORS!
,WESGATORS

 

You should publish for peer review, if enough people agree with your hypothesis, you would be recognized as the most brilliant human to ever live.

 

If someone says they "know" something for certain, it is fair game to ask them how they know and scrutinize what they present.

Objectionable might be a technically correct word to use, but I think it implies a level of contempt that I do not have. When I said "I take issue with", I mean purely in an academic sense, not a personal one. I fully support one's right to believe and have faith... not that it's even my place to support or oppose it.

I think you are conflating the noun "knowledge" and the verb "to know". I do accept that people have "knowledge" of God in the sense that they know what they read, learned, or were told. I do not believe that people "know" that God exists. That requires belief or faith. We hear people proudly say,"I am a person of faith" all the time. At the same time, they may take offense if you correctly point out that faith is belief and not concrete knowledge. And by knowledge, I mean susbstantive knowledge or proof, not knowledge of what is written or told.

I believe that Catholics do believe it. I don't think that I was implying that they don't, and certainly wasn't suggesting that my own views are those of a Catholic. The bigger picture is that whether people believe that faith and knowledge of the same thing can co-exist, it doesn't mean that they are correct to do so. If you know something exists, you don't need to believe it exists. If you only believe something exists, you don't actually know.

 

Mods, I have had the disagreeable flgator92 blocked for years. How is it that he could read my post and respond with his customary come on man?