Pointless

because scientific views especially biological ones contradict the Torah.


The reasoning behind the nobel prizes could however be explained via posession of wealth, leading to a greater education/opportunities?

"Everyone who is seriously involved in the pursuit of science becomes convinced that a spirit is manifest in the laws of the Universe-a spirit vastly superior to that of man.... In this way the pursuit of science leads to a religious feeling of a special sort, which is indeed quite different from the religiosity of someone more naive." - Letter to a child who asked if scientists pray, January 24, 1936; Einstein Archive 42-601

When asked if he was religious by an ultra-athiest like yourself:

"Yes, you can call it that. Try and penetrate with our limited means the secrets of nature and you will find that, behind all the discernible concatenations, there remains something subtle, intangible and inexplicable. Veneration for this force beyond anything that we can comprehend is my religion. To that extent I am, in point of fact, religious. " - H. G. Kessler, The Diary of a Cosmopolitan, (London: Weidenfeld and Nicolson, 1971), p.157; quoted in Einstein and Religion by Max Jammer (Princeton University Press, 1999) pp. 39-40.

And Andy folk like yourself held a special place in his heart:

"In view of such harmony in the cosmos which I, with my limited human understanding, am able to recognize, there are yet people who say there is no God. But what really makes me angry is that they quote me for the support of such views." - Prince Hubertus zu Löwenstein, Towards the Further Shore (Victor Gollancz, London, 1968), p. 156; quoted in Jammer, p. 97

You can't reinvent religion to suit your argument, Einstein believed in a g-d, he considered himself religious... So who are you to suggest otherwise?!?!?

(That surverys only a little biased )

Anyway I can provide counter surveys... For what they're worth:

http://www.livescience.com/othernews/050811_scientists_god.html

How?!?!?!?

Which part of the Torah contradicts science?!?!?!? The two go hand in hand, which is why you find such a proportion of Jews in science (we're not genetically superior at science).

Possession of wealth?!?!?!?

Oh yeah i forgot Jews control the world banks

The proportion of excelling Jews in science (or any other field) is a result of Torah studying, for generations we have been taught to question and challenge what is being presented to us... We don't study Torah we question it.

Questions are the heart of Judaism... Just as they are science.

I do believe in a personal g-d?

What i'm not sure of is how the earth communicates with this g-d.

Come again?

Most scientists subscribe to the finely balanced universe, this is in no shape or form a religous falacy - its a scientific theory which religions have correlated with their own beliefs.

You state that the only universe for us to exist in is this one, what are you basing this comment on?

So, energy is God. My cup of warm tea is more Godly than my cold glass of water. My energy saving lightbulb is less godly than my desklamp. A shower is less Godly than a bath, the devil is in the liquid nitrogen I used in my last experiment.

If that's your interpretation fair enough, at least you've explained why you feel that way; however, the scripture of which you are so fond refers to a being with the ability to communicate laws, to influence wars, to cause plagues. It implies a definite, named, specific, discreet being, with emotions.

Neither the ground, nor the tree outside our house is capable of this.

The fact that energy is eternal does not make it somehow mysterious, and thus worthy of a supernatural explanation - indeed, it would surely be more mysterious if it could simply disappear? Now that would be a conundrum for science.

I'm reminded by your quotes from your scripture of the Jehovahs witnesses who pointed to a section from their scripture that said "blah blah curvature of the earth blah". "Look!" They said. "They knew the earth was round! Therefore, the second coming of the messiah must be coming soon!", and it's a similar logic here.

Some of the elderly peoples no doubt had some advanced ideas, and some had, for example, mapped the stars with serious dedication and accuracy. Leonardos anatomy maps hold true to this day.

However, if G-d were to choose to impart information to his people, if he only communicated a few bits, would it really be the means by which snakes locate food?

Wouldn't it be more useful if he'd explained things like bacteria, viruses, fungi, the reasons why people were dying on a day to day basis, and the basic hygiene measures that could stop it?

I've heard the suggestions that there could have been a flood in the middle east around the time the bible claims, and this may well be true. However, the description from it simply cannot be true - there is not enough water to achieve a flood of the world, there is not enough space on one boat for every species in the world, and there is too much genetic diversity (and not enough recessive disease) for us to have arisen from one boatload of pairs of creatures.

I agree that the odds of simple life beginning in the universe are slim. If thats improbable though isn't it more improbable though that a being as complex as God should appear? This is where multiverse hypothesis comes in

However, I now respect the reasoning behind your opinions, it's clear that my arguments on the literality of the Torah have somewhat missed the point of what you believe in, which is something altogether less well defined. I shall reserve my vitriol for the literal interpreters in future

The full text of it is only available to Nature subscribers. How did you read it to uncover its bias? What about it is biased?

Mine's published in the most respected science journal of them all, yours on a (quite appallingly badly designed) website.

LMFAO im sure this thread was abou 4 pages long yesterday and had no mention of hebrew text in it

it's a circular argument. this is the universe we exist in. it all works in a way that seems just so perfect. but it is bound to seem like that. we are in it. if it was a differently configured then it would not support life forms like us so we would not be around to see it and say how perfectly formed it was.

it's not that someone has configured a universe just so that we can inhabit it, it's that a universe configured like this will give rise to life forms like us who can then observe it.
there may be countless other ways to configure a universe or only this way. but only one like this will have us in it.
either way it proves nothing at all

We're too imperfect to have been design - the human body is littered with errors and some quite atrocious features - and we're very similar to the animals.

As for the universe - multiverse hypothesis says there are a near infinite number of other universes - a new one for every different event The ones which can support life would be few and far between. Crazy concept but this model has superb predictive value, and that's what counts

Who knows, there may even be one with a God

and the fact thaat I'm an atheist does not stop me feeling an intense sense of the profundity of the universe, and an awe that any small ape on a tiny speck of earth whizzing round it for the short time we are alive can feel. I don't need a god to make me feel at one with the universe. I aam at one with the universe...........
we are stardust. we are golden. and we got to get ourselves back to the garden

lol and what is theory based on?

nothing but SPECULATION.... You can't dismiss g-d theory and then welcome this one in the same sentence.

Anyway I'll reply to y'all tomorrow I'm off to bed.

xx

ps. http://www.stephenjaygould.org/ctrl/news/file002.html

I read a book by stephen j gould in which he said that the idea of humans as the top of the evolutionary tree is a mistake and that we are infact an abberation as the simplest life forms such as bacteria are the most successful. the more complex a life form is, the more it is likely to die out as the conditions on the planet change. After were gone there will just be god and some bacteria.

I never stated energy was G-d, I indictated that energy was the pabulum of existence:

I concluded my thoughts on this here

Have you read the scripture Andy? have you read the Talmud? Or are you working from what you were taught at primary school?

There is an indisputed harmony amongst nature, how man and nature interacts is an amalgamation of confusion... but when we sit by a babbling brook it calms us, when we look into a dogs eyes we can sense its mood, while emotions are often on edge during the quiet before a storm... There exists within nature an unspoken dialogue which is free of language... Its is through this mediumthat I believe the G-d of the Jews communicates.

Come again? that's half a sentence from one of the largest scrolls of the ancient world?!?!?

When you have a 5 year old child do you teach it quantum physics? No you teach him the foundations on which he can later acquire this knowledge.

Only christians read the Torah literally andy....

But multiverse hypothesis is just as speculative as G-d theory, all Judaism proposes is that there is a deity; the rest of the Torah is commentry.

Whether this comes in the shape of Einsteins deity or the Christian diety is down to interpretation... but there is mountains of "scientific" evidence based on "observation" that would indicate that there could be a deity.

Then perhaps you should listen to what people tell you instead of telling them what they believe?

I'm struggling to pigeonhole your views Joe ....on the one hand, you don't view the Torah as literal, and don't believe in a God as a discreet being - on this we more than agree.....this makes you more of a pantheist than a theist, although your defense of the actions in the old testament and your attempt to correlate the beginning of the universe with the creationist description in the torah had initially lead me to believe you were a theist.

My next question - if God is not a discreet, identifiable, emotional being then what on earth is the point of worshiping it/Him?

No, no no.

I remember the physics lesson where we were first introduced to multiverse theory - I stubbornly refused to accept it for about 3 weeks, and kept on trying to pick holes in it - along with the rest of my class.

The easiest experiment to look at in conjuction with it is Youngs double slit experiment - well worth a google You put light through a double slit, and it can take one of 2 routes - but when you do it with a single photon, it can take either - how on earth does it know?!

Much, much more complicated experiments that I've never been able to understand have underlined the awesome predictive power of multiverse.

I have no idea if the multiverse is the correct model or not. What I do know is that it has excellent predictive value, and is therefore well worthy of consideration and respect.

It's an issue in science at the moment - string theory could the Theory of Everything; it's fabulously elegant. However, the experiments require such high energies as to be almost impossible. The body of science resists placing too much faith in it without these, but a small body claims that it is so elegant as to be worth of serious consideration.

I agree with the former - if we lose our cynicism, our demand for evidence, our questioning.....we are no better than religion or superstition.

again listen to what i say, not what you think I say...

I believe the Torah to be the word of G-d, I don't believe that G-d spoke to the Jews at mt sinai with a megaphone, I believe every tiny molacule resonated with his wisdom... I don't believe this to be an accumulated wisdom like that developed by man - but the laws that govern the universe and in turn govern man.

G-d theory implies that because this universe can support life there must be a G-d when the odds are so greatly stacked against it... where as multiverse theory impies that because this universe can support life there must be others that can't when the odds are so greatly stacked against it.

Both are speculations based on observations.

If you think it's improbable that simple life should develop, isn't it more improbable that complex life, particularly one capable of resonating with wisdom in everyone, should just appear?

who says it appears? we don't know whether things can exist... for example we know within this space time continuum energy is eternal - it may well be outside of this space-time-continuum.... we know within this space-time-continuum there are laws of nature which everything obides by - they may well exist externally.

We don't know enough about this universe to dictate how a deity would manifest or even porpose its purpose... If einstein couldn't comprehend it what chance do you or I have?