How did the universe begin?

Plan M

Plan M

Banned
27 September 2007
Manchester United
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Do you believe that it was started by "The Big Bang"?

Do you believe that God created the universe?

Do you have your own theories? Can science and religion see eye-to-eye?

Discuss. :)

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Yep, I would be willing to stick my neck out and say religion has (and will) cause more deaths than save lives. If George W ever gets his wish and becomes supreme ruler of the galaxy, I hope his first action is to abolish religion. Treat it like the "fight against terror". Once it's gone, it's gone.
 
Jack Bauer said:
Yep, I would be willing to stick my neck out and say religion has (and will) cause more deaths than save lives. If George W ever gets his wish and becomes supreme ruler of the galaxy, I hope his first action is to abolish religion. Treat it like the "fight against terror". Once it's gone, it's gone.
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Unfortunately there are more God fearing nutters in the US than most other countries. ;)
 
:shock: Religious nutters in the US? No way!

;)
 
Dara O'Briain Live was on telly the other day.

"If God exists, look at the beauty of a mountain and a sunset, what kind of fuck-up of a day was he having when he came up with us? With piles and arsehair and the appendix... What a great idea, something that does nothing but occasionally explode and kill you."

That and the whole dinosaurs thing seals the deal for me.
 
Jack Bauer said:
Dara O'Briain Live was on telly the other day.

"If God exists, look at the beauty of a mountain and a sunset, what kind of fuck-up of a day was he having when he came up with us? With piles and arsehair and the appendix... What a great idea, something that does nothing but occasionally explode and kill you."

That and the whole dinosaurs thing seals the deal for me.
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the best bit was

"if god created us why do we occasionally chew on our own face"
 
Yep, I would be willing to stick my neck out and say religion has (and will) cause more deaths than save lives. If George W ever gets his wish and becomes supreme ruler of the galaxy, I hope his first action is to abolish religion. Treat it like the "fight against terror". Once it's gone, it's gone.
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:shock:

i must have missed something..... how can religion cause deaths?
do u think the crusades really had something to do with christianity???

do u really think jihad has something to do with islam????

ideals don't kill anyone.... spirituality doesn't kill anyone...
neither faith or cupidity.
men kill.

u guys shouldn't be scared by spirituality or angry with religion..... u should be scared by yourselves...... if there's a "terror" we have to fight agaisnt, that "terror" is u. :roll:



btw Plan m, big bang is my answer :)
 
Good post Lo Zio, I always enjoy your input. :)

I agree to an extent with what you say. There is nothing wrong with having faith or being spiritual - there have been times when I have had to ask the big man above for help because there was nothing else - that is was God offers people: HOPE. Also you are right - it is MAN that starts wars.

I do believe that the Big Bang started the universe. I also believe that Jesus Christ walked the Earth and the Bible is more than just a book written by a clever author which is what most athiests believe. I don't know about there being one power that looks over everything.

I like to think of my religious stance as agnostic.
 
It's the big bang. I know it ;)

I don't consider religion as anything but having something to believe in. It's basically certain principles, people like to believe in. I am no believer of different religions. I say "I would like to live as a good person, without hurting anyone else intentionally." That's my belief, and hence that's my religion. We will never know what really happened at the start, so you can just choose what you have to believe in, and live live as it comes :)

@lo zio, I don't think you would argue that most calamities, are based on religion. You say men kill, but then I say, men made religion. There's nothing wrong in keeping faith in something, but when that faith turns into obsession, then you get 9/11 and then you get the recent Pakistani attack. I don't consider religion as something saintly and pure, it's man made, and man has corrupted it. And that sad part is the stereotype against certain religions (mostly Islam). Some of the most wonderful people I know are muslim, yet people associate them with terrorist attacks and what not.

I do believe that religion is one of the worst things that happened to mankind. A person can believe in whatever he wants, but when there are millions who believe in the same thing, you know there will be divisions and fights. That's human nature. And I wouldn't go far to say that most problems in the world right now are mainly because of religion.

Enough of the cheesy talk now....
 
I believe in Science, I'm quite sure the Big Bang theory was proven to have not existed recently. So those who believe in that theory, I assume believe in Science.
 
Abhishek said:
I don't consider religion as anything but having something to believe in. It's basically certain principles, people like to believe in. I am no believer of different religions. I say "I would like to live as a good person, without hurting anyone else intentionally." That's my belief, and hence that's my religion. We will never know what really happened at the start, so you can just choose what you have to believe in, and live live as it comes :)
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;):)

You say men kill, but then I say, men made religion.
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well mate, actually it's not exactly like that. If u believe, then religion wasn't made by men; it was made by the entity u believe in (God, Allah, ect.).
then men built up a structure around religion. that structure was certainly made by men, so it might be corrupted (the roman catholic christian church is probably the most corrupted structure in history).
but u have to keep those 2 aspects separated; the structure and the religion.
it wasn't God the one who sent us in the holy land 1000 years ago to do a massacre.
it wasn't Allah the one who told those guys to hijack a plane and crush it on the twin towers (we don't even know what really happened on 9\11 btw).

the simple truth is that religion is a powerful collector. so we (men) use it to push people to do something otherwise they wouldn't do.
that's all, it's pretty simple.
but when this happens u don't have to blame religion, u have to blame those bastards who manipulated other people pushing them to do something they wouldn't do just by using religion as a pretext.

afterall, there are many other "collectors".
just think at democracy. this is another very powerful collector. our governments (the american one, the british one, the italian one) told us "we have to overthrow the iraqi government to give democracy to the iraqy people".
but this can't happen. it won't ever happen. because democracy is not something u can give or teach; it's something u have to fight for by yourself.
in fact we didn't bring democracy to iraq. we just brought war.
but would u blame democracy for this??? of course not. because democracy is just a belief. Bush, blair and berlusconi, they are the ones to blame for what happened there.

also football is a powerful collector. There are kids in catania who don't even know me..... but still they hate me.... just because someone told them "if u are a catania supporter, then u have to hate palermitani"
would u blame football for this? of course not. those bastards who manipulated those kids are the ones to blame...... and also those kids, who weren't smart enough to realize how silly it is to link football to hatred.
football has anything to do with hatred, just as democracy and religion.

it's mostly important to look behind the curtain, and realize the real reasons of our problems..... otherwise we won't ever be able to solve it.
some bad people use theese collectors as tools just to create a general consent about their real purpose.
but the "cancer" is not in the "tools"... the real "cancer" are those bad people ;)

and talking about the "butto tragedy", mate honestly it hasn't anything to do with religion. it's about politics. Benazir wanted to change the status quo, and that's why she was killed just before the elections :(



@ Plan M: very good post mate. HOPE, that's what religion is about. :) ;)
 
I'm not anti religion, however it has passed its sell-by-date. Before governments, police and law there wasnt anything to keep people in check. Religion; fear of god, hell, etc was a great way for the un-enlightend to be kept from doing harm and generally created a safer society. However, now that we have governments, police, laws, etc there really is no need from that perspective.

What we are left with are religions that follow a dogmatic way of thinking and tries to keep people in check with aged, ignorant, plain incorrect idea's which the majority of people know to be wrong. Meaning that it is purely a general "guide" for the majority of people that conforms to how they think they should live, accept people's views, dont hurt your neighbour, etc. All very valid "rules" that most of us live by anyway and are found in all religions (Islam, Christianity, etc). Meaning that for those general believers the whole bible and the dogmatic preachings are meaningless and more of a sideshow, but are part of the "guide" they believe in for a good life. This is toghether with a general "fear" that live as it is without god, heaven, etc can surely not be true as that would make it, life, pretty sad and pointless. So they put faith in a god, in a religion that offers something beautiful for the afterlife. These points are all decent and do no harm.

However, its the dogmatic nature of religion and the blind that follow this dogmatic nature that are the ones that cause so much grief. They may be a very, very small minority but they cause too much damage to society.

Essentially the loose followers no longer need religion as their faith a god/afterlife and the governments, laws, etc show "the way" to a good life. Leaving religion for the blind and the often dangerous. Ergo its past its sell-by-date.

Oh, and I put my faith in science. And I don't believe in god.

As for the big bang, I don't really care enough to give an opinion. Same goes for the scale/size of the universe. I find it interesting to read about it, aswell as superstring theory and the multiple (11) dimensions that gives (10 planes of reality and one for time). However I am not going to live to see these questions anwsered anyway so I see little point in trying to make sense of it all.

JB said:
If George W ever gets his wish and becomes supreme ruler of the galaxy, I hope his first action is to abolish religion.
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You mean that righ-twing neo-conservative religious nut?!

I also believe that Jesus Christ walked the Earth and the Bible is more than just a book written by a clever author which is what most athiests believe.
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Have you seen the Da Vince Code? Or even better, the programs pulling it apart? The bible wasnt written by one clever person, it consists of the stories of the profets and was chosen by a group of "priests". And then from one day to the next Jesus was "of god".
There are so many contradictions in the Bible; the 10 commandments and then you have genesis talking about the killing of people of another faith. I thought one of the main commandments was to accept another faith?! Ive discussed, and seen it discussed a number of times on different forums and everytime you get the non believers coming up with very valid arguments about all the mistakes and you have the believers saying, "I dont care, its what I believe".

An interesting factoid; the term Virgin timed for when the bible was written means a women out of wedlock, i.e. not married. Makes Mary a slapper! :D

There was a really interesting Documentary over here a couple of months ago. What they found out, a journalist and a number of scientists, was that a lot of the stories about Jesus are identical to stories written about Julius Cesar. I didnt manage to see it sadly, but saw it discussed, and from what I can gather it was pretty conclusive evidence.

it was made by the entity u believe in
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So on which day did he/she/it create christianity? Religion is man made imo, someone started by making a "guide": bible,koran,etc. Everyone knows that it was the profits who wrote the bible, or the chapters in it. And they are all man. It was composed by priests and the church. Religion is a set of rules to live by, its man made. Ive never read about "god" writing the rules. What language did he use? The only pure language is mathmatics and Im pretty sure it wasnt in that :D.
As you say, and what I partly agree with is that religion isnt the problem, innitially anyway. It sets out to do good, however as I have written above it's no longer needed and at this time causes more problems then good.
 
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So on which day did he/she/it create christianity? Religion is man made imo, someone started by making a "guide"
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ouch, it's gonna be hard to explain it in english... i'll try anyway :)

talking about christianity technically it was born when christ started is activity as a preacher..... but that's not the real point imo. Because imo religion (any) is not about a code, a guide, it's not about rules.... it's about faith. Rules are made by men, as u correctly pointed out.
faith instead is something that borns into u. but it's not "made" by u. faith is a feeling, like love or passion.
i love my girlfriend.... but i didn't "create" that love, neither she did it. it just was born.

now, i can appreciate my spirituality and separate it from the structure. just to make an example, i consider myself a christian..... even if i don't believe in many of those dogma u were talking about.
i firmly believe in "free will". Of course the concept of free will conflicts with the concept of heaven and hell...... and that's why i don't believe in heaven and hell. does this mean i'm a bad christian? i don't think so. my friends, my girfriend and my parents keep telling me i'm not really a christian..... but who are they to tell me what i am? they're human beings, just lke me. and so the pope is. the pope thinks God abhors homosexual couples.... well i don't think so. the pope believes God thinks fucking before a wedding is not nice.... well i disagree (badly!:mrgreen:).
maybe i'm wrong or maybe he's wrong, i guess we'll discover it once we'll die.
As u correctly pointed out there are many doubts about the origins of most of the christian rules..... many of them were just created by the Church to keep europe in check (paraphrasing your words ;)), so nobody can tell me i'm not a real christian just cause i think that the story of adam and eve is just a metaphor... not even the pope (i don't think he ever had a chat with the Boss :mrgreen:).

the real nucleus, the core of any religion is just faith. if u have faith in God, then u're a christian. and it's not something u can decide, exactly as u can't decide to fall in love..... it just happens.

so i'd say that religion hasn't a dogmatic nature. but the roman Church pushed us to believe it has it. they persuaded us that religion it's all about dogma and rules..... while religion is just about faith and love.

the problems begin when we start to believe that religion is about dogma. because if we take this path, then the consequences might be enormous.
but it's all about us. we have a brain. it's our responsability to think about what people tell us and to decide what we think is agreable and what it isn't.

the dogma's territory begins where the intellect ends. if we stop using our brains, if we stop reasoning, then it's not a religion matter..... it's just our fault.



I'm not anti religion, however it has passed its sell-by-date. Before governments, police and law there wasnt anything to keep people in check. Religion; fear of god, hell, etc was a great way for the un-enlightend to be kept from doing harm and generally created a safer society. However, now that we have governments, police, laws, etc there really is no need from that perspective.
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here we are again at the structure\faith issue. if u think that religion is just about a code of rules, then u're right. and actually history testifies how "the structure" used those rules to keep people in check. but if u spoil religion of any kind of human structure, then the only thing that leaves is faith..... and faith is much more than a simple "mind control structure"..... and it's not something u might need or not.... it just happens. ;)

nice conversation btw guys :)
 
@ Lo Zio,

I guess its how we define religion and faith. From Dictionary.com:

re·li·gion /rɪˈlɪdʒən/ Pronunciation Key - Show Spelled Pronunciation[ri-lij-uhn] Pronunciation Key - Show IPA Pronunciation
–noun 1. a set of beliefs concerning the cause, nature, and purpose of the universe, esp. when considered as the creation of a superhuman agency or agencies, usually involving devotional and ritual observances, and often containing a moral code governing the conduct of human affairs.
2. a specific fundamental set of beliefs and practices generally agreed upon by a number of persons or sects: the Christian religion; the Buddhist religion.
3. the body of persons adhering to a particular set of beliefs and practices: a world council of religions.
4. the life or state of a monk, nun, etc.: to enter religion.
5. the practice of religious beliefs; ritual observance of faith.
6. something one believes in and follows devotedly; a point or matter of ethics or conscience: to make a religion of fighting prejudice.
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I consider Faith to be what we believe in as individuals, Religion is with more people, structure. As you say, Christ preached which is the start of Christianity. Meaning he was telling / preaching to others how they should live, which rules they should follow. Its probably unlikely to be as dogmatic as the bible / koran but in essence its still has structure / rules that you should adhere to. Individual belief, faith, doesnt have that.

Thats why I consider faith a good thing and religion as outdated.

I hope God isn't reading this.
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Yeah God is a Dictator - If you dont follow him and/or dissent you get put in jail / "go missing" / go to Hell. He's an arsehole! :D
 
I guess its how we define religion and faith. From Dictionary.com:
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well, mate i'm such a cocksure man.... so u will forgive me if i consider my definition better than the one the author of dictionary.com issued :mrgreen:

the word religion comes from a latin verb (latin is the language of the ancient romans): "religere". this verb means "connecting yourself with someone else"
... and this is exactly what u called "faith"..... an "individual belief" :)



I consider Faith to be what we believe in as individuals, Religion is with more people, structure.
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i see mate. then looking at it from your point of view, u're right, religion is outdated.

in my point of view instead, religion IS faith (and JUST faith). and my interpretation of faith is exactly the one u mentioned.


As you say, Christ preached which is the start of Christianity. Meaning he was telling / preaching to others how they should live, which rules they should follow. Its probably unlikely to be as dogmatic as the bible / koran but in essence its still has structure / rules that you should adhere to.
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absolutely agree on that. but i wouldn't call them rules anyway. i rather call them "guidelines" u might decide to adhere or not (that's what "free will" is about).
but the real point is that nowadays we don't know wich of theese guidelines where issued by christ and wich ones where issued later by "the Church". so in the end it's up to us to decide what we want to believe.

just to make an example, we were told God told us to love each others..... but the Old Testament also tells us that God asked Abraham to kill his own son just to prove his faith.....

now i could never love a god who actually did something like that, neither i think it really happened.....
afterall who could prove me it really happened? nobody, exactly as nobody could ever prove me Christ really told us to love each others.....

so u see, it's up to us to decide what we want to believe or not. someone could decide to believe God really asked abraham to kill his son..... and maybe this guy would decide not to have faith in this god anymore.

i made a different choice. i decided to believe that god never did this to abraham..... and no one (except God himself) will ever be able to tell me "u are just wrong", cause nobody was there when god had that chat with abraham.

maybe when i'll die God will tell me "pal u were totally wrong about the "abraham incident".....
and if this will happen i guess i'll reply "really? then mate u're the most overrated divinity ever existed" :mrgreen:



I hope God isn't reading this.
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:lmao::lmao::lmao::lmao::lmao:
this is priceless
 
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Great thread but its gone off track a bit....

What I am more interested in the sheer size of the universe. Think about it. Where does it end? Does it actually end at all? If it does what is on the other side? Fucking scary stuff. I can't quite get my head around it. I think its because in life there are always boundaries. The room you are in, the country you are in etc. Potentially the universe could go on forever in all directions and it is this fact that I am fascinated by.
 
What I am more interested in the sheer size of the universe. Think about it. Where does it end? Does it actually end at all? If it does what is on the other side? Fucking scary stuff. I can't quite get my head around it. I think its because in life there are always boundaries. The room you are in, the country you are in etc. Potentially the universe could go on forever in all directions and it is this fact that I am fascinated by.
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Its impossible to get your head round it, and the universe continues to grow aswell so its quite amazing. Just trying to understand the scale of our planet is mind bending relative to the individual. I mean you'll never get to see a "mass" that can be compared to it and the chance that we'll be able, can afford, to do "spaceholidays" in our time is also small. Stars are millions of light years away, yet we are still stuck in hours.......try to imagine a year as a single time unit. Our minds just can't, for example we cant "imagine" 365 days of the year with every little detail of each day (down to minutes or even hours). We can just about manage a week or maybe not even.

gomito said:
unfortunately that is a ridiculous statement. western europe does not = most countries...
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I wouldnt use China as an example for you valid point ;)
 
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Clockender said:
Great thread but its gone off track a bit....

What I am more interested in the sheer size of the universe. Think about it. Where does it end? Does it actually end at all? If it does what is on the other side? Fucking scary stuff. I can't quite get my head around it. I think its because in life there are always boundaries. The room you are in, the country you are in etc. Potentially the universe could go on forever in all directions and it is this fact that I am fascinated by.
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When I was a kid I used to lay in bed at night and wonder that mate. I couldn't get to sleep because of it! I don't think the human mind can contemplate there being a never-ending universe.
 
I did it in the summer, we were in the garden looking up at the sky (how romantic, ahhhhhh) and talking about what could be up there and I just thought about it nearly all night and barely slept. Like was said above, you just cant get your head around it because there's nothing to compare it to. It just makes me feel weird if I think about it.


PS. God doesn't exist.
 
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