Mallory

Just to keep the thread on track - after all it is about the Pope's visit to England and Scotland - not a soapbox for atheists!

More great pics about the Pope's visit to England and Scotland. Love his views about Christmas. Throngs of people out to see the Pope!

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/news...r-Britain.html

tonrob

I'd avoided this thread thus far on the basis that I expected it to be exceptionally dull. How wrong I was.

bugman

i think 'atheism' could be included in this thread as the pope seems to single out atheism as a problem, but typical of the pontif he says things that are simply: 1) lies 2) impossible to substantiate or 3) something an intelligent child could determine.

bugman

as for the alleged terror plot to get the pope, heck, i was almost thinking it was actually going to be richard dawkins and chris hitchens out to get him, seems that the pope didnt single out the real threat to him during the visit...other religious crazies!

I wonder if he will make specific mention of that, of course he bloody well wont, its those secular atheists who cause all the problems, what a blithering idiot the pope is.

the pope says

“There are those who would advocate that the voice of religion be silenced, or at least relegated to the purely private sphere.”

first bit straw man, i know no secularist who says silence religion, generally its religious people who want to silence other religious people, the second bit sounds perfect, and is why the USA is generally considered a good destination, religion should of course be private, the government should be utterly neutral about it and for good reason.

Mallory

Some more pics for all posters to this thread!

http://www.metro.co.uk/news/841314-p...-cameron-today

Lothianlad

There'd be little point - all of Britain's jails are full and the worst His Holiness could expect is a hundred and fifty quid fine and a Community Service Order lasting no more than eight weeks or so and in the normal run of things he would no doubt bunk out of it with ease due to lack of supervision and control.

The only people arrested by the police on a charge of attempting to endanger the Pope's life have been foreigners, not British citizens.

Malashaan

Two quick thoughts on this, I studied Physics and Philosophy at uni and this stuff is a particular interest of mine. )

1. Surely the concept of "BEFORE the big bang" is not so much intangible as non-sensical. The property of space--time we identify as time is a product of the big bang, and thus the concept of before becomes meaningless. The human brain is rooted in a cause and effect mentality and "becomings", ie we want everything to have an identifiable point where we can say before it wasn't and after it was. Even a cursory glance at the world shows that even for mundane things this is not the case, there are often many stages of "becoming" in between. The early universe was so different to what we know that it is, as you say, totally intangible in real terms. For this reason, many apparently rational questions (like "what as before?") are fairly meaningless, but it's hard for us to really appreciate that fact. Many of the "arguments" against evolution rely on a similar problem. People instinctively want to be able to identify "horse" and "not-a-horse" but no such delineation exists, nor does it need too.

2. I'll start off my second thought by briefly defining my own position. I used to say I was an atheist, like Steerpike I became uncomfortable with that as I felt many people took that as a resolute insistence that there was no higher power. and I started saying I was an Agnostic. After a while I became uncomfortable with that too, seeing many Agnostics arguing it was impossible to ever know so one shouldn't spend time thinking about it. I believe (but may well be wrong) that one day, if we don't annihilate ourselves, we will be able to answer these questions. I now just list my beliefs as "other" on forms and tell people I have my own ideas lol. Anyway, onto my point. I agree that it is totally plausable that a higher power is responsible for the big bang and hence creation. A bug bear of mine is the number of people who argue that the big bang "must have been caused by something so I believe in a creator." Why? All you've done is move the problem. You've "solved" the mystery of the universe, but you've also created an equally large (arguably larger) problem of explaining the creation of this hyper-powerful entity we loosely call God. Any theory of creation at some point has to at some point revert to "this exists because it does" which may actually be far more scientific and logical than it sounds, see Stephen Hawking's latest comments. My personal opinion is that without any new evidence, the most logical belief to hold is that the Universe exists for an unknown reason and that it probably wasn't created by a God figure as that generates more difficult questions than it answers. (Ocham's Razor in action).

Mallory

Thanks for starting the thread with those great pics. Scotland Yard doing a great job with security so far!

bugman

malashaan.

ultimately if there is a god, there is and if not, then no, its not something we can ever know, as long as it stays specifically hidden.

The main issue this thread brings up isnt god per se but the vile, patriachial, dress wearing, moralising know nothings who claim to know what god wants, they dont, they cannot know more than a butcher, baker or candlestickmaker, they piss me off no end with their hypocritical blabberings, their claims to certainty, that the whole false edifice cannot be seen as plain as day as people put money into the coffers is beyond my comprehension. ratzingers comments on condoms will in actuality lead to many dying miserably of AIDS, the contempt i feel for that man cannot be understated, he is a singularly loathesome human, he is a thousandth of any man because he abuses his position like no other.

edit: swap understated to overstated :0

nettlebed

+1. But I think you mean cannot be overstated.

Malashaan

Good point Bugman, I should have said that I think we will in time become a lot more certain. There is always the possibility that a supremely powerful being created everything and is intentionally hiding their influence, no matter how bizarre and unlikely that sounds. On the issue of the Big Bng, I think we're gaining more and more understanding and I don't think we're that far away from being able to explain the early universe and fill a lot of the holes that currently can be filled by God if one chooses. It was the attitude of not wanting to even try and find out that I found difficult to come to terms with rather than the statement that it wasn't possible to know.

As you say, this is rather drifting though. This isn't about God but about one man laying a claim to be His representative on Earth.

bugman

corrected, that is what i meant to have written!! not quite sure why i wrote that! thx.

Kaffy Mintcake

Interesting. I agree with how Steerpike has expressed himself and would also classify myself as an Agnostic too.

It may be the way I read the words of others, but several who have classified themselves as Atheists do not sound open-minded or willing to change their opinion to me, regardless of counter arguments. Rather, I read their words as "I'm right, anyone who thinks something else is an idiot." While I may not be a religious person myself, to me that attitude is incredibly disrespectful. I realize many probably don't care, but I've been surprised on BE in particular to find that some who call themselves "atheists" strike me as just as obnoxious as those who try to push religion at every turn.

Maybe it's the difference of organized religion vs. spirituality or however you would classify 'the big picture'.

bugman

of course there are lots of people who claim great things (to know the mind of god..ignoring the fact each and every one has a different version that always seems to tie in with their personal morality!! thats weird isnt it), its just that he does hold sway over 10's of millions and when that influence includes things that are actual ****ing lies then there is something very, very wrong, he deserves no special platform, well no more than any person does or doesnt.

Mallory

more pics to keep the thread intact for all interested parties.

http://www.episcopalchurch.org/81808_124609_ENG_HTM.htm