The Thoery of everything, science and religion

JMB,

I am not a Buddhist, though I have studied Zen. I am a converted American Catholic; converted, that is, from a more zealous form of Baptist theology. I came for the transubstantiation but stayed for the Saints. So many people for so many years cannot all be wrong was my line of thought. To some it may seem that I have contracted a mild form of Christianity that makes me immune to the real thing, but I don't think religion defines people's actions: it is more of an ideal or a goal. Those hungry for power or domination use religion for their ends but I don't blame their tools. I happen to like guns, too.

It seems that you are an athiest from France with a real grievance against religion; the source of wars and oppression of thought and freedom throughout the ages. I used to argue those things all the time but I'm not interested in that anymore. What matters to me is are we becoming what we decide to become, or are we the products of what random chance makes of us? What behaviors are most likely to produce what results? I'm not talking about the past, or about populations or groups, I'm talking about you and me. Memories and the next five minutes is all there is; what are we going to do with them?

<blockquote id="quote"><font size="2" face="Verdana, Arial, Helvetica" id="quote">quote:<hr height="1" noshade id="quote"><i>Originally posted by greg87</i>
<br />JMB,
I'm not talking about the past, or about populations or groups, I'm talking about you and me. Memories and the next five minutes is all there is.
<hr height="1" noshade id="quote"></blockquote id="quote"></font id="quote">
Unhappily (?), we are not alone in the world.
My opinion on the religions result from the following observations:
- Religions are residues of old terrors of men who could not understand what happened around them. It is not religion but science which gave explanations, against religions ( this struggle of religions against science remains on the evolution, quantum mechanics, big bang...)
- Religions are charlatanries whose tools are horrible, either war, or abuse of weakness. In particular (exactly as publicity at the TV), they try to destroy the mind of children. I pity those that it abuses.

I will not anymore write about religions here because this place is devoted to thought. Try to understand what Pascal wrote: "all our dignity is in thought".

OK, would you JMB & greg care to elucidate on the causes of consciousness?

<blockquote id="quote"><font size="2" face="Verdana, Arial, Helvetica" id="quote">quote:<hr height="1" noshade id="quote"><i>Originally posted by shando</i>
<br />OK, would you JMB & greg care to elucidate on the causes of consciousness?
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I am not a specialist, but I know that some animals have consciousness (not only the apes). Generally, it is the animals which are able to recognize themselves in a mirror.
Finding how our brain works is very difficult, but it is clear that there is a strong correlation between the complication of our brain and consciousness.

shando,

The causes of consciousness is a very difficult question to be sure. Hardly can two people agree on what consciousness is to begin with, much less what causes it. I woke up this morning and became more aware of my surroundings by a factor of tens of thousands of sensations to be processed from a sleep that wasn't totally unconscious. Then there are heightened states that make ordinary awareness look like sleep by comparison. Certainly complication is part of the process, but there is more than volume of data to be considered; there is also quality which makes for excitement and boredom.

Life itself is a matter of awareness and in a very real sense even a tree becomes more responsive to its environment when it 'wakes up' in the spring. It could be argued that the 'cause' of consciousness is the variety of stimulation which requires a response in order to survive. If you follow evolution in reverse that is where it leads, to the single cell that responds to its environment. Unfortunately, that is where evolutionary theory stops because there is no life we know of, including viruses, that is pre-cellular or non-cellular and a single cell is only a little less complicated than an entire organism.

I think that life is one of the basics of nature, just like chemistry and physics are. There is no argument that chemistry and physics apply on very large scales as well as very small ones with some adjustment of the rules. I don't have any real proof that life exists on larger scales, it is only an extrapolation from what I see around me every day. Of course, I don't have any proof of how far away the stars are either. The parallax of the earth's orbit with nearby stars gets extrapolated with the red shift to show that.

What I know without any doubt is that information and knowledge increase the fastest when we put money and resources into looking for it. Naturally, our collective survival instincts have made the technology of war an engine that has produced much incidental collateral information which has been useful for many other pursuits. The religions of the world assume there is a larger consciousness from which our smaller awareness flows. As for me, I would like to see, if only for a moment, a place where peace would be the dominant weapon of survival.

<blockquote id="quote"><font size="2" face="Verdana, Arial, Helvetica" id="quote">quote:<hr height="1" noshade id="quote"><i>Originally posted by greg87</i>
<br />shando,

The causes of consciousness is a very difficult question to be sure.<hr height="1" noshade id="quote"></blockquote id="quote"></font id="quote">
We are conscious if we are able to observe ourself, to consider that we are a part of nature. It is the reason for which the test of the mirror is a good test of consciousness.
<blockquote id="quote"><font size="2" face="Verdana, Arial, Helvetica" id="quote">quote:<hr height="1" noshade id="quote"> Hardly can two people agree on what consciousness is to begin with, much less what causes it.<hr height="1" noshade id="quote"></blockquote id="quote"></font id="quote">
It requires a complex brain, to be able to abstract.
<blockquote id="quote"><font size="2" face="Verdana, Arial, Helvetica" id="quote">quote:<hr height="1" noshade id="quote"> I woke up this morning and became more aware of my surroundings by a factor of tens of thousands of sensations to be processed from a sleep that wasn't totally unconscious. Then there are heightened states that make ordinary awareness look like sleep by comparison. Certainly complication is part of the process, but there is more than volume of data to be considered; there is also quality which makes for excitement and boredom.<hr height="1" noshade id="quote"></blockquote id="quote"></font id="quote">
Yes, the brain must be able to classify, abstract...
<blockquote id="quote"><font size="2" face="Verdana, Arial, Helvetica" id="quote">quote:<hr height="1" noshade id="quote">

Life itself is a matter of awareness and in a very real sense even a tree becomes more responsive to its environment when it 'wakes up' in the spring. It could be argued that the 'cause' of consciousness is the variety of stimulation which requires a response in order to survive.<hr height="1" noshade id="quote"></blockquote id="quote"></font id="quote">
No, the evolution selected behaviours which may be very complex. Thinking allows us to predict consequences of actions and select some. This needs that we make an image of the world including us.
<blockquote id="quote"><font size="2" face="Verdana, Arial, Helvetica" id="quote">quote:<hr height="1" noshade id="quote"> If you follow evolution in reverse that is where it leads, to the single cell that responds to its environment. Unfortunately, that is where evolutionary theory stops because there is no life we know of, including viruses, that is pre-cellular or non-cellular and a single cell is only a little less complicated than an entire organism.
<hr height="1" noshade id="quote"></blockquote id="quote"></font id="quote">
Yes, a cell is complicated, but we start to know how the yeast cell works and we are able to transform it very much. The evolution selected progressively very complex systems and biology is a very new science.
<blockquote id="quote"><font size="2" face="Verdana, Arial, Helvetica" id="quote">quote:<hr height="1" noshade id="quote">
I think that life is one of the basics of nature, just like chemistry and physics are.
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The classification physics, chemistry, biology is useful but not fundamental. Biology may be considered as a part of physics and chemistry.
<blockquote id="quote"><font size="2" face="Verdana, Arial, Helvetica" id="quote">quote:<hr height="1" noshade id="quote"> There is no argument that chemistry and physics apply on very large scales as well as very small ones with some adjustment of the rules.<hr height="1" noshade id="quote"></blockquote id="quote"></font id="quote">
I do not understand. The laws of physics and chemistry work in fields which are well defined. Finding a failure is a big, but uncommon invention: Try to discover a failure similar to the one which introduced nuclear science.
<blockquote id="quote"><font size="2" face="Verdana, Arial, Helvetica" id="quote">quote:<hr height="1" noshade id="quote"> I don't have any real proof that life exists on larger scales, it is only an extrapolation from what I see around me every day. Of course, I don't have any proof of how far away the stars are either. The parallax of the earth's orbit with nearby stars gets extrapolated with the red shift to show that.<hr height="1" noshade id="quote"></blockquote id="quote"></font id="quote">

We must be careful, and therefore I agree that we do not know how far the stars are, except when parallax (or similar, for instance for SN1987A) is observed.
The evaluation of the distance of the far stars and galaxies is founded on an extrapolation of Hubble's law (rejected by Hubble) who observed that the redshift of the close stars is proportional to their distance. Now, we know that the redshifts of the spectra have 3 origins:
- Doppler effect
- Gravitation (weak effect)
- Coherent parametric interaction between light beams propagating in atomic hydrogen in 2S or 2P states.
Hubble's law result from an hypothesis of a constant density of this hydrogen; this hypothesis is evidently false near a big star emitting hydrogen and far UV.

<blockquote id="quote"><font size="2" face="Verdana, Arial, Helvetica" id="quote">quote:<hr height="1" noshade id="quote">
What I know without any doubt is that information and knowledge increase the fastest when we put money and resources into looking for it. Naturally, our collective survival instincts have made the technology of war an engine that has produced much incidental collateral information which has been useful for many other pursuits. The religions of the world assume there is a larger consciousness from which our smaller awareness flows. As for me, I would like to see, if only for a moment, a place where peace would be the dominant weapon of survival.
<hr height="1" noshade id="quote"></blockquote id="quote"></font id="quote">
Science is unable to rule the relations between men. But allowing to live with less competition, it will finally, I think, allow peace on the Earth. On the contrary the religions are fundamentally aggressive, each religion teaching that it is the best one and therefore that it must surpass the other ones. Their struggle whose men are victims can only be overcome by learning, thinking, observing their absurdities.