Anyway, for those unaware I am a Deist, and for those who don't know a Deist is someone who believes in god but believes ones understanding of god is personal and can only be described by their personal experiences with the universe, thus there can be no 'Deist dogma' nor official church. I won't go into the reasons I'm a Deist just yet but I'll get to that.
Since I like to think of myself as a rational person I've been known to get into the odd theistic debate (youtube's great for that) and one argument theists often use as proof of their god is the inherent beauty of the world, and this has always disappointed me on a level beyond the glaringly obvious flaws of this argument. (The planet is in a constant state of flux between ice ages, melting ice caps ect. so while it looks good now in 10,000 years it'll probably look completely different, as well as the fact that beauty is a subjective thing and thus can't be used as an indefinite proof of intelligent design for an entire planet of people) but besides those arguments I feel there is a whole other level of this that they're completely missing, and is perhaps is one of the biggest reasons for my belief in a higher being.
You see, while the physical representation of an object can look beautiful to some, less beautiful to others and down right hideous to everyone else there is something that's universally constant, no matter your age, race, discursive background or political leanings one thing is always the same, the laws of physics. Of course I use '
The main problem here is that people seem to assume that if it came about by 'chance' it takes away from the beauty, and as a result they take away the only part of it truly elegant. Think of the beginning, a tiny point of pure energy, too condensed and hot to be anything but energy and suddenly, it explodes outward and matter starts appearing. Then from an endless sequence of matter and energy reacting to itself more and more energies form into new matter until eventually we end up with an entire planet under the perfect conditions for the natural formation of the first 92 elements which then reacted with each other in ways they couldn't in the hot, burning stars.
And after millions of years the first signs of life appeared and these signs of life grew and reproduced and became more complex with every thousand years until eventually an entire planet filled with a huge variety of different life forms developed.
I donno, maybe I didn't convey it that well here but when you think about how ordered the universe is, even when it seems chaotic, that the physical movements, they're thermal and chemical reactions to each other can all be mapped along perfect guides with mathematical equations I wonder why would anyone disregard this kind of ordered beauty in favour of a "God said poof and it all suddenly existed in 7 days time" theory...
Devious Comments
However, I think this post is more fluid than you may have realized because it's by the same process if thinking that you used that can show how these things could come about without adding a god to the equation.
While most theists that I've debated tend to think of the words "We don't know" as a defeat of their opponent I view it otherwise; there's nothing at all wrong with having the honesty to say "We don't know, yet" because it'd be foolish to think we'd have every answer there is by now. Maybe there is a god, maybe there was a universe before this one which collapsed in on itself and then erupted into what we know now.
My own beliefs are no longer quite as set in stone as they once were, but I still find the idea of things arising as they are on their own to be...awe inspiring.
My own rambling done, I must congratulate you on this post and I hope that once you're more awake that you'll perhaps go though and edit it a bit and submit it as a deviation.
Now, my only gripe is "God said poof and it all suddenly existed in 7 days time" theory...
A "Theory" in the scientific terms has a very different meaning than what it does in the common vernacular.
"the·o·ry
1. a coherent group of general propositions used as principles of explanation for a class of phenomena: Einstein's theory of relativity."
The word you wanted to use was "Hypothesis".
My sole gripe out of the whole deal. Other than that, I must say; kudos to you.
--
"Fear my .45"
"If the liberties of the American people are ever destroyed, they will fall by the hands of the clergy" ~ Marquis De Lafayette
'Till Next Time,
~John Damen
Life, The Universe and Everything
42.
--
"Fear my .45"
"If the liberties of the American people are ever destroyed, they will fall by the hands of the clergy" ~ Marquis De Lafayette
'Till Next Time,
~John Damen
But I may do that, thanks for the words of encouragement. I suppose the Non-intrusive god is a fairly close representation of what most Deists believe however you'll probably find a lot of them prefer not to think of it in terms of 'god/s' but rather a 'first cause' that merely set off the big bang (everything thereafter was inevitable with the laws of physics and probability). Personally I like to think of it more as a higher power that governs all things, a sort of body of physics that maintains the laws of the universe (that's probably the quickest way to condense my beliefs, it's hard to describe your philosophy on how the whole universe works in one sentence
But in the end I suppose I'm aiming to put forward an argument for the elegance of the universe more than theism itself.
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Only experience is knowledge, everything else is just information.
Member of =MedievalCommunity
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Only experience is knowledge, everything else is just information.
Member of =MedievalCommunity
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