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Meet With God


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I would say, "You're boring. When can I leave you to go talk to Shakespeare, Einstein, Fitzgerald, Hemmingway, Salinger, Feynman, Kant, Lawrence, Twain, Picasso, and others?"
Oh, we're actually answering?I would say, "You've made a mistake." Then kill it.
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Oh, we're actually answering?
No, I wouldn't consider what I said to actually be an "answer." To me, the question is similar to asking:If you had 15 minutes to talk to yellow, what would you ask?orIf you had 15 minutes to talk to happiness, would you be jealous?or If you had 15 minutes to talk to the Dirac Equation, what would you talk about?etc
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To me, the question is similar to asking:If you had 15 minutes to talk to yellow, what would you ask?orIf you had 15 minutes to talk to happiness, would you be jealous?or If you had 15 minutes to talk to the Dirac Equation, what would you talk about?etc
Not to me.Yellow can be defined and exists and I can show you.Happiness can be defined and the correlating physiological phenomena, which we call "happiness" when experienced, can be examined and I can show you.Though I don't know wtf the Dirac Equation is, I assume it can be defined and is quantifiable and you could show me.None of this applies to God.
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Oh, we're actually answering?I would say, "You've made a mistake." Then kill it.
Then you'd take over, I hope.
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Then you'd take over, I hope.
I hadn't thought that far ahead in this little thought experiment, but this is rather likely. Also, logically progressing from the assumption I would take over: upon my first blink as The Supreme (if indeed I needed or wanted to blink anymore), the entirety of what we now call "the universe" would serve as the physical makeup of my Divine Erection. I would spew supernova ejaculate all over the dark void abyss of nothingness and clean up the mess with a cosmic tissue threaded with the concepts of love and pity transmogrified into cloth. I would be an awesome god.
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I would be an awesome god.
Obv...many of us already worship you.
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No, I wouldn't consider what I said to actually be an "answer." To me, the question is similar to asking:If you had 15 minutes to talk to yellow, what would you ask?orIf you had 15 minutes to talk to happiness, would you be jealous?or If you had 15 minutes to talk to the Dirac Equation, what would you talk about?etc
You picked that? Couldn't you pick some cool operator? Like..say.. the Laplace Transform?I'm definitely not religious myself, nor do I believe in God, but I still find it fun to think of him existing. Maybe I should have asked: "Pretend God is real and you were able to meet with him for 15 minutes, what would you say?"I mean, let's pretend that you were able to ride a light beam... Hmm, I guess that's not possible so we shouldn't even think about it...
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"Pretend God is real and you were able to meet with him for 15 minutes, what would you say?"
There are various problems with this, even taken as a silly hypothetical. First of all, which God are we basing this fictional character upon? Also, we have to clarify that we aren't talking about the impossible, impossible gods people believe in with childlike ignorance and wonder. An omnipotent, omnipresent, all-good God is utterly impossible given the problem of evil (letting alone the problem of there being no separation between an omnipotent and omnipresent "thing" and any of its composite parts, but the list goes on and on). So we have to qualify it something like, "If there were some big alien creature, or a creature of which earth is a physical part, and this creature has vast power given its relative size and/or abilities compared to humans, yet still retains the human personality traits and feelings and M.O. of xxxxx religion's central character, influencing events in the ways set down in xxxxx religious text, how would you respond to meeting this creature for 15 minutes?"But of course this wouldn't be all that interesting a question because the answers would be easy to anticipate. Most any religious person would object to the question outright as it doesn't fit in with his or her blind fuzzy feelings on the issue. Most any critically minded person would describe an outraged or disinterested encounter with a beast so heinous, as variously described in nearly any religious text, as to be an affront not only to any reasonable and logically founded ethical model, but grievous in offense against even our most primal instincts concerning revolting behavior and conduct.I fleshed out your question to the quoted rephrasing when I answered, and my answer still stands.
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Maybe he should've said "pretend God is real and you are simple-minded."
Too easy. "I don't have to pretend. You see God is real according to my life, my experiences, the things I've been through and the sanctity of the Holy Bible and our Lord Savior Jesus Christ. It is not if I meet with God but rather when. And when I meet with our Lord God I shall exalt and worship Him as is His due. Not for a mere 15 minutes, but for all eternity shall I stand at His right hand in the Kingdom of Heaven. Herp a durp."Or a similar variation depending on which superstition we use for the question. A lot of "there is no God but God and Allah is his name and Mohammad is his profit" or "Xenu needs your money", depending.
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And when I meet with our Lord God I shall exalt and worship Him as is His due. Not for a mere 15 minutes, but for all eternity shall I stand at His right hand in the Kingdom of Heaven. Herp a durp."
As Mark Twain observed, man thinks he will be perfectly happy doing for all eternity something that bores him to tears one hour a week.
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As Mark Twain observed, man thinks he will be perfectly happy doing for all eternity something that bores him to tears one hour a week.
Ba ha ha. That's a great quote.
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As Mark Twain observed, man thinks he will be perfectly happy doing for all eternity something that bores him to tears one hour a week.
Twain also said another of my favorites, "Go to heaven for the weather, hell for the company."
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"In their struggle for the ethical good, teachers of religion must have the stature to give up the doctrine of a personal God, that is, give up that source of fear and hope which in the past placed such vast power in the hands of priests. In their labors they will have to avail themselves of those forces which are capable of cultivating the Good, the True, and the Beautiful in humanity itself. This is, to be sure, a more difficult but an incomparably more worthy task…" Albert Einstein

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“I cannot accept any concept of God based on the fear of life or the fear of death or blind faith. I cannot prove to you that there is no personal God, but if I were to speak of him I would be a liar.” Albert Einstein

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Twain also said another of my favorites, "Go to heaven for the weather, hell for the company."
"I do not fear death. I had been dead for billions and billions of years before I was born, and had not suffered the slightest inconvenience from it."-TwainThat one's my favorite.
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The highest principles for our aspirations and judgments are given to us in the Jewish-Christian religious tradition. It is a very high goal which, with our weak powers, we can reach only very inadequately, but which gives a sure foundation to our aspirations and valuations.Albert EinsteinI have found no better expression than "religious" for confidence in the rational nature of reality, insofar as it is accessible to human reason. Whenever this feeling is absent, science degenerates into uninspired empiricism.Albert EinsteinThe bigotry of the nonbeliever is for me nearly as funny as the bigotry of the believer.Albert Einstein

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The highest principles for our aspirations and judgments are given to us in the Jewish-Christian religious tradition. It is a very high goal which, with our weak powers, we can reach only very inadequately, but which gives a sure foundation to our aspirations and valuations.Albert EinsteinI have found no better expression than "religious" for confidence in the rational nature of reality, insofar as it is accessible to human reason. Whenever this feeling is absent, science degenerates into uninspired empiricism.Albert EinsteinThe bigotry of the nonbeliever is for me nearly as funny as the bigotry of the believer.Albert Einstein
These are good quotes. That guy knew what he was talking about.
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"Does there truly exist an insuperable contradiction between religion and science? Can religion be superseded by science? The answers to these questions have, for centuries, given rise to considerable dispute and, indeed, bitter fighting. Yet, in my own mind there can be no doubt that in both cases a dispassionate consideration can only lead to a negative answer. What complicates the solution, however, is the fact that while most people readily agree on what is meant by "science," they are likely to differ on the meaning of "religion."As to science, we may well define it for our purpose as "methodical thinking directed toward finding regulative connections between our sensual experiences." Science, in the immediate, produces knowledge and, indirectly, means of action. It leads to methodical action if definite goals are set up in advance. For the function of setting up goals and passing statements of value transcends its domain. While it is true that science, to the extent of its grasp of causative connections, may reach important conclusions as to the compatibility and incompatibility of goals and evaluations, the independent and fundamental definitions regarding goals and values remain beyond science's reach.White=Haired Einstein in a SweaterAs regards religion, on the other hand, one is generally agreed that it deals with goals andevaluations and, in general, with the emotional foundation of human thinking and acting, as far as these are not predetermined by the inalterable hereditary disposition of the human species. Religion is concerned with man's attitude toward nature at large, with the establishing of ideals for the individual and communal life, and with mutual human relationship. These ideals religion attempts to attain by exerting an educational influence on tradition and through the development and promulgation of certain easily accessible thoughts and narratives (epics and myths) which are apt to influence evaluation and action along the lines of the accepted ideals.It is this mythical, or rather this symbolic, content of the religious traditions which is likely to come into conflict with science. This occurs whenever this religious stock of ideas contains dogmatically fixed statements on subjects which belong in the domain of science. Thus, it is of vital importance for the preservation of true religion that such conflicts be avoided when they arise from subjects which, in fact, are not really essential for the pursuance of the religious aims." Albert EinsteinI would have no problem with the religious in society if they would take this truism to heart.

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"When I was a fairly precocious young man I became thoroughly impressed with the futility of the hopes and strivings that chase most men restlessly through life. Moreover, I soon discovered the cruelty of that chase, which in those years was much more carefully covered up by hypocrisy and glittering words than is the case today. By the mere existence of his stomach everyone was condemned to participate in that chase. The stomach might well be satisfied by such participation, but not man insofar as he is a thinking and feeling being.Young EinsteinAs the first way out there was religion, which is implanted into every child by way of the traditional education-machine. Thus I came - though the child of entirely irreligious (Jewish) parents - to a deep religiousness, which, however, reached an abrupt end at the age of twelve.Through the reading of popular scientific books I soon reached the conviction that much in the stories of the Bible could not be true. The consequence was a positively fanatic orgy of freethinking coupled with the impression that youth is intentionally being deceived by the state through lies; it was a crushing impression.Mistrust of every kind of authority grew out of this experience, a skeptical attitude toward the convictions that were alive in any specific social environment — an attitude that has never again left me, even though, later on, it has been tempered by a better insight into the causal connections.It is quite clear to me that the religious paradise of youth, which was thus lost, was a first attempt to free myself from the chains of the "merely personal," from an existence dominated by wishes, hopes, and primitive feelings. Out yonder there was this huge world, which exists independently of us human beings and which stands before us like a great, eternal riddle, at least partially accessible to our inspection and thinking.The contemplation of this world beckoned as a liberation, and I soon noticed that many a man whom I had learned to esteem and to admire had found inner freedom and security in its pursuit. The mental grasp of this extra-personal world within the frame of our capabilities presented itself to my mind, half consciously, half unconsciously, as a supreme goal. Similarly motivated men of the present and of the past, as well as the insights they had achieved, were the friends who could not be lost.The road to this paradise was not as comfortable and alluring as the road to the religious paradise; but it has shown itself reliable, and I have never regretted having chosen it." -Albert EinsteinGreat insight into religion and the religious today. He had much more to offer us than special and general relativity. But religion is easy, and is most often selected by the masses because the alternative is not.

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Wonder if anyone will get this"'We know that we know nothing,' they chatter, blanking out the fact that they are claiming knowledge -- 'There are no absolutes,' they chatter, blanking out the fact that they are uttering an absolute -- 'You cannot prove that you exist or that you're conscious,' they chatter, blanking out the fact that proof presupposes existence, consciousness and a complex chain of knowledge: the existence of something to know, or a consciousness able to know it, and of a knowledge that has learned to distinguish between such concepts as the proved and the unproved."

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