Science Doesn't Have All the Answers

Watched Horizon last night. Apparently, "Most of Our Universe is Missing".

The deeper we explore the Universe on a grand scale, or at the sub-atomic level, the crazier it looks. We have come to a point where scientists are forced to make stuff up and some say they are close to religious fantasy in their creative interpretation.

Basically, if Newton's laws of gravity are right, there is not enough visible mass in the Universe to hold it together. And that's why they've invented "dark matter" and "dark energy" to fill up the missing 96%.

Some will say "Ah ha, see, science doesn't have all the answers." and push this as further evidence for the existence of God. Clearly, a supreme being is holding the Universe together.

What a cop out that would be if we approached everything we didn't understand that way. There would certainly be no modern medicine keeping us alive...

19th Century Doctor 1: "These people keep dying and I just can't work out why."
19th Century Doctor 2: "I know. I can't work it out either."
19th Century Doctor 1: "Must be God."
19th Century Doctor 2: "Yep."

Do You Believe in Father Christmas?

If you wake up on Christmas morning to find a gift wrapped in paper at the end of your bed, does that prove to you the existence of Father Christmas?

No-one admits to putting it there, so the only real answer is: it must have been the guy in the red suit coming down the chimney.

Why would we assume that? Because we know the story of Father Christmas and this event seems to fit perfectly into the story.

Exactly the same principle works with religion. We know the story: we are taught faith when we grow up as children, just like the story of Santa Claus. We look at the world and it seems to fit into this story we have been told.

This is a very irrational, childish way of thinking.

God is really just Father Christmas for adults. "If you're good, you'll get presents." = "If you're good you'll go to heaven."

What is the difference? Not much.

Once you're running a successful religion, you can change the value of "good" to suit your needs. If you want to destroy America, you make: GOOD = Destroy America and off your little followers go to destroy America, with the promise of presents firmly imprinted on their thoughts.

Also, followers need to believe the present is for them, even though there is no label on it.

There's no label on this world, but followers of a god believe it has been given to them by their god.

Yet, if you ask a respectable grown-up Christian "Do you believe in father Christmas?" they'd laugh at you for suggesting they have such a weak mind.

Gods are for adults who don't want to grow up. They need an authorative father figure to make them behave; to make them feel protected. They can't make that final step to independance. They can't make those moral "good vs bad" decisions for themselves. They need someone to tell them when they've been bad.

I also suspect they can't stomach a world where you can be bad and still get your presents.

Religion, the curse of humanity

It's been said before. Colonel Robert Green Ingersoll was saying it about 150 years ago. That doesn't make it any less true.

I can understand why people want to believe that there is some part of them that is indestructable, I just don't understand how they believe it.

Surely, you'd have to be stupid. But there's plenty of people who are extremely intelligent, far more intelligent and intellectual than me, who believe in a supreme creator.

There's no evidence that God is anything other than a human invention. None whatsoever.

The fact that many incredibly intelligent people do believe in a god is unbelievable. It is probably the only absolutely undeniable fact in this world which I find almost impossible to believe.

This fact is so far-fetched, in fact, it almost makes me believe there is some kind of supernatural force at work.

For incredibly intelligent people to believe such an absurdly ridiculous notion (that a god created the Universe) it is so unlikely, there is only one possible explanation - it must be a miracle.

Muhammad - the Cartoon

What I want to know is, how do they know it's a drawing of Muhammad?

I mean, does it matter whether the drawing is an accurate depiction? If I were to draw a picture of Muhammad but modelled him on a 74 year old lady pensioner from Eastbourne, would that still be offensive, even though the drawing clearly does not depict the prophet?

How about if I drew a tea cup which I labelled as the prophet Mohammad, would that still be offensive?

The thing is, if no-one knows what he looks like, and no-one has ever been allowed to depict him, how does anyone know when he's being depicted?