So, apparently we atheists are incapable of answering the following questions:
1. What was in the beginning?
2. How will life on earth end?
3. What happens after death?
4. What is the purpose of existence?
5. Why there is order in all of creation?
6. Why there is morality in every civilization?
7. Why does every civilization believe in a Creator?
8. Why does every sane person have a conscience, even when it is not dictated by society?
9. How did nothing create everything?
10. Which came first--the chicken or the egg?
I would say that anyone can answer the questions, the problem is that fundies, like Ray, are under the impression that their answers are the right answers. Nothing like marking your own work to get a high score, eh?
But I am interested;
What are your answers?
I will be marking them and you'll be given grades according to your responses. Those not achieving a passing grade will stay behind after class to copy, by hand, the complete works of Ray Comfort...
You may begin.
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
Posts
I am not any kind of scholar but here is my very humble opinion.
ReplyDelete1. What was in the beginning?
How the hell should I know? And why should I care? What does the beginning have to do with the now unless you are trying to fit God into the equation. Sure it's an interesting topic but not something I dwell on.
2. How will life on earth end?
Again, how should I know and why should I care? Pondering the end of the Earth seems like a morbid way to live life.
3. What happens after death?
Nothing
4. What is the purpose of existence?
You are assuming that existence "requires" a purpose. I don't agree with that.
5. Why there is order in all of creation?
Is there? Hadn't noticed. Though the sciences seem to explaining a lot of this fairly well. Again, I don't waste my time thinking about such things, I leave that to the experts.
6. Why there is morality in every civilization?
So than the fundies would agree that the Muslim doctrine of stoning non-virgins and infidels is "moral". They would also agree that female genital mutilation is "moral". How about the Chinese, who drown female infants, that sure sounds "moral".
7. Why does every civilization believe in a Creator?
Because a "creator" was the only way primitive man was able to explain his world. This is the weakest question on here. So we are suppose to just "believe" because of what people who lived 4000 years ago thought?
8. Why does every sane person have a conscience, even when it is not dictated by society?
Define "sane". How do you know every sane person has a conscience? Have you talked to every sane person on the planet? Is there some empirical test of sanity that I was not aware of?
9. How did nothing create everything?
How did a "pure spirit" create mass and matter? Why is this point so important? I'm just not self-involved enough to care about "why I'm here", I AM here, might as well make the most of it.
10. Which came first--the chicken or the egg?
Exactly.
1. If the Big Bang is right, then a tiny, tiny point full of all the mass and energy contained in the universe and also a giant huge vast void of limitless nothing.
ReplyDelete2. By dying. What other answer should there be? Cataclysm? Armageddon? Why does the end of life require a Big Event?
3. Our body decays. Beyond that, since nobody has come back from the dead and the "soul" seems intangible and ineffectual in the world, is it necessary to havce an answer?
4. It exists, if that can be said to be a purpose, which I would I would argue against.
5. Is it order, or is it cosmic/submolecular cohesion? We see the order because the order is a necessary component our existence. We're a by-product of things operating without direction, and a vastly small one at that.
6. Because without it, a civilization would likely die out(and/or isn't a civilization in the first place). See #8.
7. Because they didn't have the answers to fundamental questions, nor did they have effective tools to find them, so they attributed it to the best solution they could come up with. See #8.
8. See "Selfish Gene" by Richard Dawkins.
9. Nothing didn't create everything but it can't do that. Everything came into existence. There is math to suggest this.
10. The egg. The beast which laid the egg was slightly not a chicken and what came out of the egg was a chicken.
Seriously, we can't answer these? Really? Half of them are only asked because Ray thinks the answer is important, but they're just esoteric "Want to have an answer to feel good" questions. They don't actually mean anything.
1. The beginning of what? space-time? the earth? before space-time?
ReplyDeleteThe beginning of space time was a rapidly expanding singularity that contained all the mater in our universe. I would assume that is what he means.
2. More than likely with the earth be enveloped by the sun as it goes red giant. There is a possibility that the milky way galaxy and thus the earth will be destroyed when it collides with another galaxy.
3. you rot and your matter gets broken down to be reused as fertilizer for living plants.
4. To pass on your genetic material, other than that what you make of it.
5. Well what do you call order? If you mean the scientific laws, well they are just explanations of naturally occurring phenomena. I really don't know what he means by order.
6. Evolution and natural selection. Morality helps the group and was thus selected for because we are social animals.
7. To explain what they couldn't explain. If they couldn't figure it out it must have been some all powerful being.
8. This is same question as the morality one. It was selected for because we only survive as social creatures, we are not solitary hunters, we need other humans to survive, so it helps being nice to others.
9. It didn't. Current ideas have everything in a single singularity before space time. The only group claiming everything came from nothing are Creationists.
10. the egg, since fish lay eggs and dinosaurs laid eggs, well before chickens came about.
As someone said,
ReplyDeleteA chicken is merely and egg's way of making another egg.
Well done mates!
ReplyDeleteThe idea that the purpose of existence is the evolutionary function to pass along our genes never sat well with me.
ReplyDeleteThis answer implies people who cannot have children or choose to not have children have no purpose in life.
This answer has already popped up several times in response to Ray's question.
I hate to say it, but atheists, you got to try harder!
Come up with some better answers! ;)
Speaking of good answers... "A chicken is merely and egg's way of making another egg."
ReplyDeleteBrilliant, my good Froggie!
My thing is that only a few of these questions have reasonable responses, and the rest are sort of meaningless because the key words are inherently indefinite.
ReplyDelete1: Define Beginning, and who says there has to be a beginning? There are no "Beginnings" in the natural world, well sure theres the first time an event happens, but other events happen before it, so none of us have ever witnessed, nor will we ever, a "Beginning."
2: All life? Sun goes nova, Earth becomes uninhabitable a while before it is consumed.
3: Define Death. After my heart stops beating? Well my body decomposes over time, depending on what happens to it.
4: Define Purpose. If man defines purpose then it is whatever they do that satisfies themselves, since that is on what they would base their perception of purpose. If man doesnt, and its instead some God character, then any understanding of such a purpose would be imperfect, so we can never know.
5: Define Order. Empirically there is none, but we percieve it because our minds are adept at ordering concepts in order to better understand them. Just because we see it doesn't mean its there.
6: Define Morality. If you mean the similarity in moral codes across all civilisations that have survived any length of time, then morality is simply an evolved trait among the group that is beneficial to survival, and has a completely natural explanation.
7: Man naturally anthropomorphizes natural forces, such as lady luck and father time, as a primative way to deal with a world they dont understand completely, or to sublimate another emotion (for instance, smacking a television to "convince" it to work).
8: "Conscience" exists as a personal manifestation of the local, contemporary moral zeitgeist, see #6.
9: Define Nothing and Everything. Second thought, don't, never happened.
10: Define Egg. I mean you do know theres a chicken in that egg, right? And so that that chicken came from another chicken before it, who was slightly different but still fundamentally chicken. At some point, from the last chicken evolutionary progenitor, there was the first birthing of what we would now call a chicken, which was naturally hatched from an egg, laid by a non-chicken. The answer is the egg.
Kaitlyn, I agree with you to a point. The question wasn't "What is the pupose to life," but "What is the purpose of existence."
ReplyDeleteI'm of the opinion that there is no pupose to exist, it just exists. If it didn't exist, it wouldn't exist. There is no opposing viewpoint to "existence," there is no negative to it. Nonexistence is entirely a neutral, and so you can't even say "It exists because the contrary would suck." There is only "suck" with existence.
Now, directly to your question, your problem implies that man somehow exists above the animals. We don't, we're just able to see our differences. Biological evolution shows that beings who don't have children (either because they can't or just don't) won't continue their genes and so genetically don't matter.
But I agree that we shouldn't be so quick to dismiss childless humans. Robert Sawyer is an award-winning author (and a ridiculously nice guy, to boot. I had dinner with him and his wife once). He has made the decision to not have children, meaning whatever genetics is involved in the intelligence and talent that has won him nearly every SF award on the planet is going to be lost. But to him, he is still making an impact because he believes that his ideas are outliving him. His ideas are his children, and they contribute.
Even with that, I follow Kaitlyn's lead and ask "why is reproduction somehow considered a purpose?" What makes it one? It is a drive, and a motivation for the gene to survive. But is survival a purpose?
1. What was in the beginning?
ReplyDeleteAccording to current scientific thought, the big bang.
2. How will life on earth end?
Well, I think it's pretty obvious that Da Jebus is gonna pop out of the sky with a sword in his mouth and smite us all.
No, seriously, I have no idea. I could speculate that it might end in nuclear war due to the tensions and hostilities between nations, but I have no idea how life on earth will end and I don't believe anyone else does either.
3. What happens after death?
Depends on how the death occurred as to the rate that the body decomposes. Other than that, nothing.
4. What is the purpose of existence?
As far as individuals are concerned, I think you give your own life meaning.
As far as mankind in general is concerned I do not believe that there is any one purpose.
5. Why there is order in all of creation?
What order there is can be explained through science. Also, just because something appears to be orderly doesn't mean it is and if it is it doesn't mean a deity played any part in it.
6. Why there is morality in every civilization?
People learned a very long time ago that is it advantageous to not do certain things like steal from your neighbor because they most likely will reciprocate by stealing from you. Thus, certain patterns of behavior emerged that made living together without doing harm to your neighbor more advantageous.
Also, humans are altruistic from birth.
7. Why does every civilization believe in a Creator?
Because people are prone to seeking answers and when they do not have an answer to something they tend to fill in the gaps with what they suspect or wish to be true.
8. Why does every sane person have a conscience, even when it is not dictated by society?
Not every seemingly sane person does. There are a lot of people that seem sane, act sane and are as sociopathic as the day is long.
Also, the definition of sane changes from one time period in history to the next.
As to why most people have a conscience, I would say that it is a combination of internalizing the current rules of society, inborn altruism, and because it is advantageous to behave in a way that benefits others, thus benefiting yourself.
9. How did nothing create everything?
It didn't.
10. Which came first--the chicken or the egg?
Egg.
I like that we're posting our answers here instead of at the Swamp. It means Ray can't steal our answers for his own personal use. :-)
ReplyDeleteOK...here goes:
ReplyDelete1. What was in the beginning?
Please define "beginning".
2. How will life on earth end?
Most probably it will slowly roast as our sun balloons into a red giant at the end of its life. With any luck, humanity will have made it off the planet by then, but judging from our performance to date, I'm not making any bets.
3. What happens after death?
Nothing. Nonexistence. Blissful oblivion. I'm actually rather looking forward to it.
4. What is the purpose of existence?
To exist. Consider yourself enlightened, my child. That'll be 50 quid.
5. Why there is order in all of creation?
First, the words "order" and "creation" need to be clearly defined.
6. Why there is morality in every civilization?
First of all, morality among human civilizations is extremely relative. The statement "There is morality in every civilization" is oversimplistic to the point of dishonesty.
Second, a sense of morality is a survival trait. Societies formed of individuals with senses of morality fared better than those that did not.
7. Why does every civilization believe in a Creator?
A consequence of a creature with a brain complex enough for abstract though, confronted by situations he could not explain and had no power over.
8. Why does every sane person have a conscience, even when it is not dictated by society?
A "conscience" is a survival trait possessed by healthy humans, that contributes to the survival of the group. The "conscience" is not a concrete thing, and often varies widely from individual to individual. If an individual's sense of morality is below a certain threshold, the rest of society makes the statement that the "have no conscience", and judge them to be insane.
9. How did nothing create everything?
We currently have insufficient data to answer that question.
10. Which came first--the chicken or the egg?
Eggs were being laid and hatched hundreds of millions of years before the first "chicken" appeared on the planet.
I don't know! (for any of them)
ReplyDeleteBut to pay homage to Scmike:
How does the universe account for absolute, universal, immaterial laws of logic and reason when these characteristics do not correspond with the universe??
LOL!!! I figured that I I started it, it would diffuse the situation.
Kaitlyn,
ReplyDeleteYou said,
"The idea that the purpose of existence is the evolutionary function to pass along our genes never sat well with me.
This answer implies people who cannot have children or choose to not have children have no purpose in life."
It only shows that some people choose to be a genetic dead end and some people "are" a genetic dead end.
With the gene pool we now have, it makes no genetic difference.
I have my very real and what I consider a good purpose for my life,:
To experience it in anyway I damn well choose within the societal norms that I operate under- don't wanna go to jail, although some people have gone to jail to achieve their purpose.
Thanks for be the devil's advocate on this one.
/d
1. What was in the beginning?
ReplyDeleteAt the point at which time begins, our best explanation for the evidence we can see is that there was a super-dense point of all the matter and energy in the universe very shortly after it had began to expand.
2. How will life on earth end?
At the very best it will be destroyed by the sun going supernova if it doesn't already get wiped out by environmental change or catastrophic impact with space debris.
3. What happens after death?
A funeral. Reading of the will. A wake. Burial or burning. Crying and possibly drunkeness.
4. What is the purpose of existence?
I was unaware that there needed to be one beyond that which we define for ourselves. There's certain no evidence that there is one.
5. Why there is order in all of creation?
It's interesting that fundies always attempt to use the second law of thermodynamics (incorrectly) to criticise evolution, yet forget about their supposedly correct understanding of the nature of the universe when it becomes inconvenient.
6. Why there is morality in every civilization?
It probably arose because species that co-operated were more successful at breeding than those that did not. Beyond the mere existance of *a* morality, there is no *universal* morality anyway.
7. Why does every civilization believe in a Creator?
Do they? Proof?
If they do, it's likely to be an inevitable consequence of the (wrong) perception that mind and body are separate.
8. Why does every sane person have a conscience, even when it is not dictated by society?
For the same reason that every sane person has legs even though they're not dictated by society.
9. How did nothing create everything?
I've no idea. I've yet to meet someone who wasn't a fundie that actually thinks that's even the case.
10. Which came first - the chicken or the egg?
There were eggs before the first chicken.
For those of you playing along, here's Ray's answer key:
ReplyDelete1. What was in the beginning?
God.
2. How will life on earth end?
God.
3. What happens after death?
God.
4. What is the purpose of existence?
God.
5. Why there is order in all of creation?
Goddidit.
6. Why there is morality in every civilization?
Goddidit.
7. Why does every civilization believe in a Creator?
Goddidit.
8. Why does every sane person have a conscience, even when it is not dictated by society?
Goddidit.
9. How did nothing create everything?
Goddidit.
10. Which came first--the chicken or the egg?
Chicken. (God would also have been acceptable).
Trip gets an 'A' and goes to the front of the class !!
ReplyDelete1. What was in the beginning?
ReplyDeleteIf you can prove that there was a beginning, I will tell you what was before...
2. How will life on earth end?
Either freezing or deep fried. I don't know enough about physics to be sure.
3. What happens after death?
Do you really want details? Rotting flesh is kind of disgusting. There is no soul independent of our body.
4. What is the purpose of existence?
We're just transportation for our genes. How we spend our lifes is up to us.
5. Why there is order in all of creation?
In living things: ATP. Please show me the order in my synapses...
6. Why there is morality in every civilization?
Survival of the fittest?!
7. Why does every civilization believe in a Creator?
Because human brains developed to look for causes.
8. Why does every sane person have a conscience, even when it is not dictated by society?
Empathy is something that has to be learnt. Babys don't have it.
9. How did nothing create everything?
I don't understand quantum physics, but starting with protons the whole story is quite understandable. How many Christians cried, when they heard that organic substances can be created anorganically? Do you really want to push God in that corner? It's starting to get extremely narrow there...
10. Which came first--the chicken or the egg?
There where eggs long before there were chicken. Could you tell me the exact second when you started being old?
I agree with all of the above. Interesting how there seems to be a general consensus about the answers. I take this as evidence of the Great Atheist Conspiricy.
ReplyDeleteIn thinking about #5, I'd add a nod to the weak anthropic principle: if there were no regularity (a more accurate term than "order") then we wouldn't be around to ask the question.
I'm going to be posting the answers and scores soon, so if there are any stragglers; please finish up and submit your answers to the front desk in the next 30 minutes...
ReplyDeleteactually Rays questions are quite redundant.
ReplyDeleteYou could easily reduce them to two:
1. What is the first cause? (#1, #5, #7, #9, #10; and he didn't even think of asking if there is a first cause)
2. Am I important? (#2, #3, #4, #6, #8)
1. What was in the beginning?
ReplyDeleteAn infinitely massive point (according to one theory).
2. How will life on earth end?
As the sun gets older it acculmulates helium in its core. Helium is denser than hydrogen so the core of the sun gets hotter. The hotter it gets the more hydrogen the sun can fuse into helium. The sun will become an F class star long before it becomes a red giant. As an F class star, it'll be too hot to support life on earth. Earth will fry long before the sun goes red giant. However, the moons of Jupiter might look good.
3. What happens after death?
The rest of the world goes on. I'll die, but the earth will keep turning as they say.
4. What is the purpose of existence?
Maybe there isn't an ultimate purpose. Why does there have to be one?
5. Why there is order in all of creation?
Because of natural laws. Also, humans are known to see order in random patterns where none exists.
6. Why there is morality in every civilization?
Because it is hard wired into us by evolution. Altruism is a survival skill.
7. Why does every civilization believe in a Creator?
I didn't know that every civilization did. If you're talking about ancient civilizations, then yes they all did believe in their pagan creator gods. Are you comparing your creation story to those pagan myths?
8. Why does every sane person have a conscience, even when it is not dictated by society?
See number 6.
9. How did nothing create everything?
I don't know! You tell me since your the one that said that. I never have said that nothing created everything. How about the infinitely massive point mentioned in #1? Maybe that was the something that created everything.
10. Which came first--the chicken or the egg?
Several ways to answer that.
#1. The egg is the chicken. The chicken is the egg. A chicken egg and an adult chicken belong to the same species (Gallus gallus).
#2. If you go back through all the chickens ancestors, you'll eventually get to the common ancestor of all life on earth. In this sense, the question is a false dichotomy. There are more than two choices. In this case, the answer is a prokaryote.
#3. The egg. If I consider "The Chicken" as a certain individual chicken (such as the one in my freezer) then the answer can only be "The Egg." Since the chicken had to hatch from an egg, before he ended up in my freezer. (Think about it.)
#4. The Chicken. If I'm thinking of "The Egg" as a particular egg (like the one I just got out of the fridge), then I have to consider that the egg in my hand was layed by a hen. So, the Chicken came first. Something had to lay the egg that I am now holding.
I'm posting a copy of this on AC.